A Perfect Fit
by tini243
Summary: They felt like nothing and no one could ever come between them. They were wrong.
1. TOW the surprise

**A Perfect Fit**

Summary: They felt like nothing and no one could ever come between them. They were wrong.

Category: Angst /Romance; JR, some CM

Rating: M

A/N: Huge thanks to Exintaris for betareading and general encouragement. I wouldn't know what to do without you, honey.

A/N2: This is a JR story. So I guess one has to be interested in that pairing to want to read this story. Especially since it's not so much the 'getting there' I'm dealing with in this story, it's more the 'What might be the consequences?'.

**

* * *

****Chapter 1 - TOW the surprise**

"…and you won't believe how warm the water was, it was like in a hot tub."

The newly wed Bings had come home a day early from their honeymoon and were sitting with all their friends in their living room, telling stories about their holidays. They obviously had had a lot of fun and even met a nice married couple they wanted to have dinner with sometime.

"Aww, really? I am so jealous. I would have nothing against lying on a sunny beach instead of suffering through this dreadful weather we're having here," Rachel said dreamily.

"Come on, Rach, if it's cold, you're complaining, if it's warm, you're complaining too. You just don't know what you want."

This comment earned Ross a warning glare from Rachel, but she didn't remark on it further. Instead she turned to Monica.

"And how was the food?"

"Oh, don't ask. That was actually the not so great part of this vacation."

"That is so not true, Monica," Chandler retorted, "You're just way too picky."

"I'm not picky, I have a fine sense of taste."

"You're picky."

"I am no…"

"Hey guys," Phoebe exclaimed very loudly, bolting out of the bathroom holding something up.

"Look what I just found! Someone is having a BABY! Oh Monica, I am so happy for you two."

Everyone's gazes went to Chandler and Monica. Chandler looked terrified. Monica looked as if someone had just told her a very bad joke.

"I am not having a baby, Phoebe. What makes you say that?"

"Here, I found a positive pregnancy test in the trash."

"That is not mine."

"So then whose is it?"

All five pair of eyes suddenly fixed on the only remaining woman in the room, since it was obviously not Phoebe's.

Rachel had buried her face in her hands, shaking her head.

"Rach, what …" Ross started, but Rachel got up in a hurry and stormed out of the room.

Now everyone looked at Ross. Everyone but Joey, who just stared right ahead.

"Hey, why are you looking at me like that? I don't have anything …" Ross said defensively.

"Oh my God."

Joey's almost whispered words turned the friends' attention to him.

"Joey, do you know anything about that? I didn't even know Rachel had gone out with someone lately," Monica asked concerned and still shocked.

"Rachel, wait," Joey suddenly hollered, jumped up and headed for the door. When he was at the door he paused and turned around to his friends, smiling wistfully. "We're gonna have a baby."

……

No one said anything for the longest time.

Monica was the first one to get her wits back. "Phoebe, what exactly were you looking for in the trash?"

"Certainly not Rachel's pregnancy test, that's for sure."

"Why is Rachel throwing her pregnancy tests into our trash anyway?" asked Chandler.

This was something Phoebe had already figured out. "I suppose she hadn't wanted Joey to know, so she thought throwing it in her own trash would be too risky."

"Why would that be risky?" Monica cut in. "I don't think Joey would go through his own trash."

"Stranger things have happened," Chandler said with a face that indicated that he wouldn't put that past Joey.

"Just for the record," Phoebe stated, "if anyone ever gets pregnant again, please don't throw your pregnancy tests in my trash."

"I second that," Monica hurriedly agreed.

"Are we through with that?" Ross, who didn't even appear to be following the conversation at all, suddenly exploded. "Is anyone of you even going to comment on the fact that Joey apparently slept with Rachel? Or am I the last one to know that?"

Chandler looked over to Ross unfazed and answered, "Well, we thought we'd start with the easier questions and go from there. And no, we had no idea."

"Yeah, I certainly didn't see that one coming," Phoebe said with a nod. "She stole my backup. Ross, would you consider…"

Ross shot her a warning and very not amused glare.

"Next question would be why she was trying to hide it from Joey?" Chandler wondered.

"Probably because she already figured out that he is an irresponsible womanizer who might be good for having sex with him, but wouldn't be any good as a man to raise a child with."

Everyone looked in horror at Ross, who had said that in an unbelievably cold and cutting tone.

"Ross, we know that this isn't easy for you and we're trying to be understanding, but if you think you can say stuff like that under my roof, you'd better go right now."

Chandler looked at Monica appraisingly. He knew she was eloquent and he knew she was protective of her friends, but he'd never thought she would defend Joey against her older brother. Especially not when this meant giving up on the hope of Ross and Rachel ever being a couple again, which he knew she'd secretly wished for, because it pained her to see Ross pining away for Rachel like that.

"I love you," he blurted out.

"Aww Chandler, I love you too."

"Uhm guys, as long as you two are kissing, might I bring up the question of why we didn't notice that something was going on with those two?" Phoebe looked questioning at Ross who fumed quietly. "Anyone?"

"In retrospect, there were some things that did seem strange."

"What, Chandler?"

"Joey wasn't on a date for, like, two months. When I asked him about it he always told me he had so much stuff to do at work and it wore him out, but that didn't stop him before. And the door to their apartment was locked an awful lot. I haven't played a decent round of foosball with him in weeks."

"Yeah…" something seemed to have occurred to Monica. "Remember at our wedding, when we looked everywhere and couldn't find them and then they were suddenly back, all smiles and bright eyes? Or when we had our last movie night as singles and they both came too late because they had to work, but looked really happy about it?"

"Joey had his hands all over her the whole time during that movie," Ross remarked darkly.

"Yes, of course," Phoebe squealed. "There was that one time I came into the coffeehouse and they were there. They didn't even seem to notice me because they were so engrossed in their conversation. I almost had to yell at them to get their attention. Although I should have asked myself why Joey had his hand on Rachel's thigh. And when they noticed me, he drew his hand away as if he had burned it."

"And you didn't pick up on that, Phoebe?"

"Hey, it was Rachel and Joey, I would never have thought of that. Besides, didn't you tell me about that one time you went over to Joey's and Rachel was walking around half naked? She normally wouldn't do that when Joey is home. Why didn't you pick up on that, Chandler?"

"But…" Chandler started to defend himself, but stopped again as something seem to occur to him. "Yeah, you're right, Phoebe. It seemed a bit weird. Now that I think about it, I could've sworn it was Joey's shirt she was wearing. And when Joey came out of his room totally embarrassed, he wasn't even done getting into his pants. I can still remember that I thought how weird it was that she was walking around in only a man's shirt while Joey was having a girl over."

Phoebe and Monica were giggling uncontrollably. "You were so walking in on them doing it, Chandler. And you tell me I should've picked up on him touching her somewhat inappropriately?"

"They weren't doing it! Rachel came out of the bathroom, if you have to know."

"Probably just getting a new box of condoms," Phoebe said, still giggling.

"Which in the light of recent events might not have been the case," Chandler said, now chuckling too.

"I can't listen to this anymore!" Ross hollered and got up. "Is this only a joke for you? Because let me tell you, it isn't for me."

Monica's smile faltered immediately. "Ross, I'm sorry, I can't even imagine how you must feel right now. We were not trying to make fun of this, it just feels so unreal, so improbable. We're not gonna laugh about it anymore, okay?"

Ross just stared at his sister, seething. Phoebe appeared to be deep in thought.

"Don't you guys think that the two of them have looked really happy lately?"

Chandler weighed that thought for a while. "When you put it like that, yeah, I guess so. I mean, Joey is the sort of guy who always has a smile on his face, but in the weeks before our wedding, he seemed content and somehow centered, in that quietly happy sort of way."

"That is what I should have picked up on!" Monica exclaimed. "Rachel was glowing. She was always smiling to herself, and when I asked her about her secret boyfriend she told me I was being silly, but she always looked as if she was seconds away from telling me. If I hadn't been so wrapped up in the wedding, I would have found out she was with Joey."

"How long has this been going on?" asked Ross, who seemed to have calmed down a little.

"No idea, couldn't be more than two months, three at most, because I remember Joey being on a date about two and a half months ago."

"You guys really think he is serious about her?"

"Could be. When I asked him once why he stopped making jokes about me getting into wedlock, he said that when he found the right girl, he would want to get married too. I guess Joey Tribbiani settled down and we didn't even notice."

"Good God! They are _supposedly_ together for two months, they didn't even _bother_ to tell us and now we're talking marriage? I can't believe this is happening!"

"Will you calm down, Ross? Yeah, it sucks that they didn't tell us, but hey, who am I to talk. They're going to have a baby. And as hard as this must be for you, whatever happened between you two in the past, it isn't important anymore. Now it's them, and the child they're going to have. And we are their friends. We're not judging, or second guessing their decisions, we have to be supportive. So if you want to be a friend to them, be supportive. If not, just stay away from them and don't get in their way. This is nothing that should get messed up."

"I don't know, Monica. She is the love of my life. I can't just give her up."

"Stay away from them, Ross. Please, do me that one favor as a friend. Let them figure things out on their own. It seems like it's not all happiness for them, too. Don't make this harder on Rachel than it already is. Please."

After this speech from Chandler, Ross turned around and left the apartment without a word.

"He's really taking this hard," remarked Phoebe with a hint of compassion in her voice. "He always thought they were lobsters."

"We all thought that. Even Joey did."

"I wonder how they got together."

* * *

... and that you'll find out in the next chapter. Hope you liked it so far. Please leave a review. 


	2. TOW Rachel and Joey get together

A/N: There are two more chapters that introduce the general storyline, before things really get to the central point of the story in chapter four. Please bear with me until then. Also, the story is rated M for chapters like the following. Consider yourself warned.

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**Chapter 2: TOW Joey and Rachel get together**

Seven weeks earlier – day 1 (of Joey and Rachel's relationship, timeline is counted up from this day on)

For a while now Joey had been watching Rachel reading a magazine while shaking her head in short intervals. "You don't agree with 'Cosmo' today?" he asked after a few minutes.

"You're watching me read?" she asked indignantly.

"I'm bored. So?"

She sighed dramatically, deciding that since he probably wouldn't leave her alone anyway, she might as well tell him. "It's this article about 'Spicing up your sex life."

"You want to spice up your sex life, Rach?" he grinned.

"Well, even if I did, I wouldn't try it the way they suggest," she sniped back.

"What do they suggest? Oh, wait … let me guess…having sex in public," he said, leering suggestively.

She looked at him, frowning. "You've already read it?"

"No, but I guess I could've written it."

She figured that it might be actually interesting to hear what Joey would have to say to that, so she put the magazine away and went to the kitchen to get herself something to drink. On the way over she tried to sound very casual while asking, "Then maybe you could explain to me how having sex in a janitor's closet is even gonna work?"

Joey laughed for a while until he realized that she was obviously expecting an answer. "Seriously? Rachel, what are you? A fifteen year old virgin?"

She scowled at him angrily. "Hey, answer the question. How do you do it in a room where two people barely fit in?"

He stood up from the lounger and walked over to her, looking a bit as if he wanted to explain something really complicated to someone really stupid. "Uhm… but you've already heard that there is the possibility of doing it standing, right?"

"I've heard of it, but it's not possible for me."

He shook his head with mock disbelief. "Come on, Rach, of course it's possible. I've done it a lot of times already."

"I didn't say it is generally impossible, I'm saying it's impossible for me. I'm so small and all the guys I've been with were taller than me, so it didn't work."

"What has your size to do with anything?" he asked, looking genuinely puzzled.

"Look," she said standing beside him pointing first at her own hip, then at his.

"… everything on me is like – down there, and everything on you is like – up there. See, totally wouldn't work."

Joey snickered with barely concealed glee. "Rach, of course you can't stand on your feet while it happens. The guy has to lift you up."

"Joey, I said I'm small. That doesn't mean one guy can hold me the whole time. I didn't exactly go out with bodybuilders. And, you know, what about all the movement that is required? I can't see how that'll work."

Without warning Joey pushed her against the nearest wall, grabbed her thighs and wrapped her legs around him. He pressed himself flush against her and she admitted to herself that the only reason it wouldn't work right now was all the clothes that were in the way.

"See, this is what I'm talking about. The wall supports most of your weight, you can hold yourself up with your arms and legs and I am not gonna demonstrate how the movement is gonna work but you have to believe me, it works just fine."

A tremor ran through his body at the thought of actually doing this with her. Her barely audible sigh made him think that she had noticed his reaction.

"Yeah, I think I understand the concept now. I just hope no one's gonna come in right now. They might be tempted to misinterpret a perfectly innocent situation."

He let her down gently and they spent an awkward pause trying to smooth invisible wrinkles out of their clothes. Rachel was the first to break the uncomfortable silence. "Wow, looks like 'Joey love' is really something special."

A slightly proud grin stole onto his lips before he looked down, embarrassed. "Look Rach, I'm sorry, I guess I didn't think that through. I wasn't meaning to hit on you or something."

"No, I know, Joey. You don't have to be sorry. It's just … I think I felt something. Didn't you feel anything?"

"Yes, I think I did. But you know, we're both pretty hot, so, it's probably normal."

"Yeah, you're probably right. It just felt like the two of us would be… a perfect fit."

They both stared at each other, trying to make sense of their suddenly very confusing emotions. "I made us drop out of the friend zone, didn't I?" Joey guiltily admitted.

"Yes, maybe. I'm just not sure if this is a good or a bad thing. I… I have to go to work."

"It's seven in the evening Rachel, why would you go to work now?"

"It usually helps me clear my head and get a bit of perspective on complicated emotional stuff."

She grabbed her jacket she discarded just a few hours ago and stormed out of the door.

………

When she came back seven hours later, she found Joey fast asleep on the Barcalounger. She was glad about that, because, although she'd gotten a lot of work done, she hadn't been getting anywhere in the 'thinking about Joey' department. Not that she didn't think about him, it just hadn't gotten her anywhere. She felt like she was thinking in circles, so she finally gave up on figuring things out and went home, hoping he might be asleep already.

He was lying there in his bathrobe, tightly curled together as if he was cold. Rachel took a blanket from the couch and covered him with it, spending a few moments looking at the peaceful expression on his face.

She never allowed herself to think about him this way, but there was no denying that he was strikingly handsome. The incident from before had given her a taste of what being with him could be like. Never had she considered that his womanizing lifestyle could actually be considered a plus when thinking about having a relationship with him. There was no doubt that he would know what he was doing, that his experience could be an advantage.

Sighing she got up and headed for the bathroom. If it were just about having someone to have great sex with, the decision would be a no-brainer. But she was too old, too jaded to get herself into this. She couldn't afford to get her heart broken again by someone who was not serious about a relationship, by men who couldn't resist the temptation of another woman only an hour after a non-break-up. And he was Joey.

Everything that was a plus in the 'having great sex' category came out a big fat minus as far as having a stable and trusting relationship went. Was she setting herself up for the inevitable by starting something with a man like him? Or worse, was she seeking it? Was she going after the wrong guys for some reason buried deep within her?

Why couldn't relationships come with a guarantee, why did they have to be so risky, so dangerous? Would being with him be worth all those risks?

Maybe. Probably. There was no way to know that for sure without trying it.

There it was again. The circle. She knew it was risky but she didn't know if it was worth it. She couldn't know if it was worth it without taking the risk.

All her thinking lasted for as long as she was in the bathroom, showering and preparing herself to go to bed. When she finally came out, Joey had settled under his blanket but still looked uncomfortable.

From the look of it he had waited for her to return. She couldn't just go to her own comfy bed, leaving him thereto wake up with cramps in the morning. After arguing with herself for a while, she decided to do the right thing and wake him upto send him to his bed.

"Joey, wake up," she whispered, softly stroking his face.

Before she could move away, he bolted upright and their heads met with an audible thump.

"Ouch!" both cried in unison, pressing their hands against the place where it hurt.

Rachel felt a bit dizzy and slumped down on the lounger. "God, I'm so sorry, Rachel, you startled me. Is everything all right, can you hear me? Do you think you have a concussion, should I call a doctor?"

"Wow, dial it down, Joey, it's nothing. I was just a bit faint from the pain, but it doesn't even hurt that much anymore, I'm good. I am a bit of a sissy when it comes to pain, that's all."

"I am sorry, I didn't mean to..."

"It's okay, Joe. Shh..."

She couldn't concentrate when he was babbling and she was trying to concentrate on what she felt right now, lying almost in his arms like that.

Since 'almost' wasn't enough for making an informed decision, she snuggled a bit closer. Yeah, that was more like it. Really nice and cozy. She could definitely get used to this.

She felt him moving closer as well, sending a flash of excitement through her.

"Want me to kiss it better?" he whispered into her ear with a warm, very deep, very sexy voice she'd never heard him use before.

"Hmmyeah," was about all she could manage at this point.

It was not so much the growing need inside of her that took her ability to speak, it was the realization that they were getting to the point where she had to make a decision one way or another. Staying friends or becoming something else. Safety or passion. She was starting to lean towards passion. He kissed the place on her forehead where they'd hit their heads together. Soothing, open mouthed kisses, soft and tender, wandering slowly down the side of her face. Before he reached the place she thought he was headed for – her mouth – he stopped and leaned back a little.

"Did some thinking at work?" he asked still with that rumbling sexy timbre.

That was it, the point of no return. Panic raced through her before a sudden flash of clarity gave her an idea. What about telling him about her fears? At least this way he would know what she expected, it would give him the opportunity to get out of this himself.

"I'm scared, Joey."

"Of what?"

"Of getting hurt again, of what happened with Ross happening again. And I don't want this to be just a one time thing. I need this to be real."

In this moment she wished there would've been more light in the apartment for her to judge the look on his face. "I did some thinking too," he said finally, when she already felt the panic rising in her chest again.

His fingers brushed lightly over her face in a loving gesture. "This is kinda new for me, but I don't want this to be a one night stand either. You mean a lot to me, Rachel. A lot. And I promise, I swear, I won't hurt you – ever."

She had to fight back the tears burning in her throat. "At least – not intentionally," he added with a smile in his voice, lightly touching the sore spot on her head.

"You can always kiss it better."

"You sure?"

"Yes, Joey, I'm sure."

When his lips were touching hers lightly in a deliciously sweet first kiss, she knew without a doubt that she made the right decision. As his kisses gained intensity, when his hands started to roam her body, she waited for the awkwardness to start, she waited for the urge to giggle, to push his hands away just because they were Joey's hands. The hands of a man she had considered her friend for seven years now. It never came. Instead she found herself arching into his exploring touch, answering his tender kisses with more demanding ones of her own.

Heat started to course through her veins and as admirable as Joey's self control was, she wanted more and she only knew of one way to show him. With a quick movement she turned him around onto his back and attacked him with feverish kisses.

He seemed to respond in kind until he suddenly groaned and pulled away from her.

"Argh… this is so uncomfortable…"

It took her about a second to jump off the chair and take at least three steps back.

"All right, Joe, we don't have to…" she stuttered, feeling too stupid and embarrassed for words. That was something that had never happened to her with any guy she had wanted to sleep with, but she figured that there was a first time for anything.

Joey looked totally flustered. "Rach, what…?"

"It's okay, this was probably a mistake anyway, let's not…"

"What are you talking about? I…" Then it looked like it finally hit him what her reaction was about. "Oh no… no, no Rachel, that wasn't what I meant, I… the chair… the armrest was poking in my back, that's what's uncomfortable."

He got up quickly and went over to where she was standing, taking her hand and slightly tugged at it as if he wanted to lead her to his bedroom.

"Rachel, please… I want this. Let's take this someplace where we have more… space."

Her embarrassment still lingering, she couldn't quite muster the excitement she had felt before and all the doubts and reservations came back in a rush.

"I don't know… maybe that was a sign... that we… shouldn't do it."

Still holding her hand he stopped tugging and looked down. "It's okay if you don't want to, but… maybe you should try and see if there are any more signs if it's a bed."

Her resistance dissolved at his words, and when the tugging started again, she let herself being led step by step towards his room.

He was moving backwards, and when they were finally in his room he pulled her to him and started kissing her again, in that tender, seductive way just like before. The heat was back in an instant, as if it only had been lurking in some part of her body, ready to pounce as soon as she had made up her mind.

She moaned and buried her hand in his hair, pulling him closer, deepening the kiss. At that he started to kiss her more aggressively, more determinedly. He gently guided her towards the bed and motioned for her to sit down, while he himself crouched down in front of her. He firmly held her gaze when he started to untie the knot on her bathrobe.

The fact that she was naked under there occurred to her the moment his nimble fingers had completely opened the knot. He was about to see her naked. The man who had slept with a million women, some of them stunningly beautiful, was about to see her naked. Selfconsciousness, formerly unknown to her, flooded her and she drew a sharp breath, prompting Joey to still his movements and look at her searchingly.

She dreaded the question he might ask, or better, she dreaded having to answer it, having to admit to that feeling of vulnerability.

But instead of asking a question, he slowly ran his hands up the front of her bathrobe and when he reached her neck, his fingers brushed against the soft skin there, only to travel further to the side, taking the piece of clothing with them.

With excruciating slowness, his gaze unwaveringly holding hers, he pushed the robe down her shoulders and then down her arms until it fell off by itself.

It was then his eyes started to wander over her body, taking in every square inch of exposed skin. Her heart hammered in her chest like crazy. She couldn't even tell if it was excitement or apprehension or maybe both. She felt her nipples harden just from the way he looked at them, she felt her body ache for his touch, her skin shiver in need of feeling his against it.

When he looked her in the eyes again, her doubts about herself vanished without a trace at seeing the honest admiration, the unveiled desire in his eyes.

"You are so beautiful," he whispered hoarsely and she couldn't help but believe him. She couldn't help the way her heart melted at this and her body almost started screaming for him.

He didn't let her wait. He put both his hands on her thighs and while drawing lazy circles on the inside of her thighs with his thumbs, he kissed her neck, moving a bit downwards with every one of these heat inducing touches of smooth lips against sensitive skin.

His hands wandered almost imperceptibly slowly up her thighs, his thumbs still caressing the soft skin. Involuntarily her legs spread a little, giving his hands even more room to do what felt so good. Meanwhile his lips had reached her breast and she threw her head back, moaning loudly at the sudden delight at feeling his mouth covering her nipple, surrounding it with hot wetness, teasing it with an astonishingly agile tongue. The thought of what else he might be able to do with that tongue tore another loud moan from her throat and she had to brace her arms behind her on the bed to keep her upper body upright.

When he changed sides, lavishing the same attention on her other breast, the feeling of air cooling the sensitized wet skin provided another extremely arousing sensation.

Her body hummed with sexual energy, her insides seemed to pulse in rhythm with her frantic heartbeat and for a fleeting moment she wondered why they were only doing this now. Her train of thought came to a screeching halt, however, when his roving hands finally reached their goal, when she felt his fingers delicately dipping in between her legs.

"Gah… oh Joey… yeah…" An unstoppable stream of appreciative utterances came out of her mouth when his fingers found the centre of her desire, skillfully bringing her arousal to an even higher level.

She was torn between wanting him to end the madness by bringing her to fulfilment as quickly as possible and wanting to endlessly enjoy the exquisite sensations he could so easily invoke in her.

His mouth left her breast and the trail of kisses went south, stopping at her bellybutton for a while until she gave up on wanting to keep upright and plopped backwards on the mattress with a loud groan.

A moment later she realized what she had invited him to do with that move, but being too wrapped up in herself to even lift her head she just whispered, "Joey, you don't have to…"

"I want to," he gave back in a ragged whisper and a split second later he did.

Nothing could've prepared her for how good it felt, for how close she came to the edge after just a few well placed licks. Just when she thought she would come any second he pulled back a bit, blowing a wisp of breath over her engorged flesh, making her wail with frustration.

He got back to work a second later but again, when the edge was just a hand's breadth away, he did the same thing. She vowed to herself to kill him should he do that again, but managed nothing more than a pleading, impatient moan.

Luckily for both of them, the next time he didn't stop. Every nerve ending began to burn and her body clenched tightly before an overwhelmingly intense wave of ecstasy swept her away and turned her vision black. The tremors ran through her again and again until every tension in her body had vanished and it felt like her body had turned to jelly.

It actually took a bit of an effort to open her eyes again and when she did, she looked into two pitch black eyes, the fire of passion visible deep within.

Letting her gaze travel down a bit, she noticed that he had gotten out of his bathrobe as well and that he obviously had moved her a bit so they both could lie on the bed comfortably. The thought that she hadn't noticed any of that made her smile.

"What is it?" he whispered.

"Just noticed that I must've blacked out for a while."

"That a good thing?"

"It is."

"Seen any signs so far?"

"No," she breathed, moving her hand further down his body, under the covers, until she reached his erection. He closed his eyes and moaned quietly when she lightly ran her hand down his length.

"I want you," she said and before she couldn't say or think anything else, his mouth was on hers, his tongue delving deeply into her mouth. Together with him lying almost on top of her it gave her the feeling of him being everywhere. But instead of this being scary or feeling like it was too much, it felt like there should be more.

If she had been able to say something, she would have told him that there was one more place she wanted him to be, but since she couldn't actually say it, she spread her legs and ground her hips wantonly against him.

Being obviously good at taking hints, he pulled back from her, fished something out of the nightstand and after putting on a condom wasted no more time gently easing himself inside her, in a way lacking the urgency he must have been feeling.

Still highly sensitive from what he had done before, her body welcomed him inside without resistance and the feeling of him stretching her, filling her, made her wish – hope – that this time it would be different. That with him, it would be enough just like this. Although just thinking of the many fruitless attempts at reaching an orgasm just through this cooled down her excitement considerably.

He began to move and she tried to empty her mind, to only concentrate on the sensations coursing through her at every one of his deliberate, slow thrusts. She enjoyed the feeling for a while until she noticed his breathing becoming ragged, his thrusts becoming erratic, although he apparently tried to hold back, to wait for her.

Another cold shower hit her at the realization that it wouldn't happen this time either. She didn't want him to wait for her, it was pointless anyway.

She drew his head to her and breathlessly whispered into his ear, "Let go, Joey. I won't… I can't…"

He went still on top of her, panting heavily. Just when she started to worry about what would happen now, she heard his voice rumbling into her ear. "Do you trust me?"

It was an odd question giving their current situation but it wasn't one she couldn't answer.

"I do. I trust you."

Her voice sounded a lot more breathless than she felt. Maybe the arousal was just hiding somewhere again, waiting for things to happen.

He pulled back from her and she couldn't help being disappointed at the loss of the feeling of him inside her. Then he took her right leg and put her foot over his left shoulder. After draping her left leg over his right shoulder in a similar way, he lifted her pelvis a bit and tilted her into a somewhat uncomfortable position. As she felt him pushing inside her again, he laced his fingers through hers and pressed her hands into the pillow on either side of her head.

She couldn't move at all and when she felt him pushing deeper and deeper, panic started to rise inside her. She was trapped.

"Rach… look at me," he said softly. When she did what he said, the panic subsided.

This was why he had asked her about trust and in this moment it became clear that her answer was the truth. She trusted him, she just knew that he would never hurt her.

She felt herself relax, giving up her resistance, giving herself over to him. It was up to him now. She never would've guessed what that notion alone did to her. It freed her of all the pressure of being responsible, of having to achieve something, of making sure to be good.

Just as he had done before, he held her gaze, not allowing her to close her eyes or look away. And she didn't feel the need to. Usually, she closed her eyes during sex, trying to concentrate on what she felt. She could still do that, but looking into his eyes allowed her to get lost in him, to see his feelings, to let him see hers. It built a connection that made this seem so much more than just a physical act, although with a sudden fiery rush, the need awoke again, reminding her that this was very much something physical, by warming her blood, speeding up her heartbeat and shortening her breath.

When he began to move again, a sudden jolt went through her, spreading rippling waves of pleasure through her whole body. She cried out softly and looked at him in surprise. A smile lit up his eyes that were still fixated on her face. "Found it," he murmured, repeating his move again, getting an ever stronger reaction out of her.

The exquisite pressure of being close began to build up inside her at an almost impossible speed. She didn't know if she wanted to laugh with joy or cry with relief. When she came, when her vaginal walls contracted around him, heightening the sensations, it sounded to her like she did a little bit of both.

He followed her over the edge with a loud groan.

After pulling back from her and carefully disentangling them from their position, he stretched out beside her, propping his head up on his hand and looked at her with a happy and slightly proud smile.

She returned his smile and mouthed, "Wow."

His expression became more serious and he obviously struggled with something he wanted to say.

"Rach… when you said you can't… what were you thinking?"

"What do you mean?"

"I had a feeling you were thinking yourself out of it. What was it?"

She closed her eyes for a second, contemplating not telling him, making something up like she always did with the other guys. Finding some lame excuse. Mostly she had avoided that question by faking it, even with the man she had loved. She didn't want to lie to Joey, though. He seemed like someone who could handle the truth.

"When I said I can't I meant… it never happened… like that," she admitted in a husky whisper.

Joey's eyes went wide. "What?"

Or not. "Joe, please…"

"It's just… Rach, you're so sensitive to everything…" he said quietly and dragged his fingertips over her body slowly. As if to prove his point, she couldn't suppress a content sigh at his touch. "…so sensual," Joey continued, "… it's kinda hard to believe."

"It's impossible for a lot of women," she said defensively.

"Not for you," he countered matter-of-factly.

She turned to him and said, "Only in that position."

His mouth curved into a mischievous smile as he admitted, "That only made you stop thinking."

Her eyes went wide at that. She had been convinced he had brought his knowledge about women's most sensitive spots to good use. But obviously, he knew more about women than where their erogenous zones were.

"I had no idea you were that manipulative," she smiled. "Does that mean it might happen again?"

His fingertips gently brushed over her breasts and it felt like little sparks of electricity charged her body with sexual energy once again.

"Definitely," Joey finally answered, looking at her with an odd seriousness.

She grinned at him delightedly.

"Wow, we've gotta try that."

"So you really want it to be more than just… this?" he asked, haltingly and still serious.

"Of course I do. I told you."

"Yeah, but…" he trailed off and sagged back against the pillow. "You wouldn't be the first woman to have second thoughts about that."

Cold crept down her spine at an unexpected realization. It wasn't only that he used women for meaningless sexual encounters. Probably more than once, it had had to be the other way around as well. He gave off something that made it easy to put him into a category, no different from what she had thought not too long ago. Womanizer; great to have sex with, not so good for a trusting, loving relationship. She wondered how many women had acted on that assumption, and with how many of them he had wanted it to be more. She knew of Kate, Ursula and Erin, but now it seemed like they hadn't been the only ones.

"Hey," she said while rolling over to be able to look at him, "I'm not having second thoughts. I just had… a pretty amazing experience and I'm not gonna turn my back on the man who I had it with. What's with you, do you have second thoughts now?" she teased.

"No, I mean… not about wanting to be with you, but… What about the others, what about…"

She hurriedly put her fingers over his lips, preventing him from saying the name that she didn't need to hear right now.

"Joey, why don't we take one step at a time, see where this is going? Look at Mon and Chandler. We didn't know about them for months."

He shook his head.

"I'm awful at keeping secrets. You know I can't lie."

She scooted closer to him until their bodies touched and her face was so close to him the tips of their noses bumped together.

"You don't have to," she whispered against his mouth before kissing him. "We live together, it's pretty easy to keep it from everyone for a while just by locking the door. And if they have a suspicion, if they ask, we'll tell them. So you won't need to lie."

He looked at her and she could still see a million questions lingering behind his eyes. It wasn't like she was completely convinced and sure of that herself, but right in that moment, feeling his body next to her, having his face so close, knowing what he could make her feel, she didn't care about the things outside this room, outside this bed.

"I feel so… weird," he whispered barely audible.

"Let me kiss it better," she whispered and then she did. When he finally kissed her back, it didn't take them long to arrive at the point where they were to find out if Joey's theory about her was right.

It didn't surprise her at all that it was.

* * *

tbc 


	3. TOW all the love

A/N: Beware, some JnR mush is coming up. Cherish it, as far as this story goes, it has to last you for a while.

**

* * *

Chapter 3 - TOW all the love **

Day 40

"Hey, look at you all dressed up."

Rachel closed the space between herself and Joey, who was standing in front of the mirror, trying to get his tie straight. She turned him around and tightened the knot of the tie herself. When she was finished with that she ran her hands wantonly over his chest.

"Hmm, am I not the lucky one? I'm gonna go home with the most gorgeous guy of the party."

She didn't quite know why she felt the need to seduce him right now. It was certainly not the best timing, since they were about to go to Monica and Chandler's wedding in a few minutes. But as always she couldn't keep her hands off him. And flattery always worked nicely.

"And I'm gonna go home with the most beautiful girl. I think this is the first time ever that I went to a wedding knowing beforehand I would have sex with the hottest of the bridesmaids."

She smiled at that. At first she had been uncomfortable with the thought that there had been so many women before her, but the way he treated her, like she was unique and the most amazing, most beautiful woman he'd ever met, made her realize that she didn't need to fear any competition. She was sure that those days were behind him and eventually she could even joke about that again. Like now.

"Oh come on, Joe. You always knew that beforehand."

"Yeah, you're right. But I swear I was never so looking forward to it."

He had become more comfortable with the subject, too. She knew that he had tried to hide this from her for a while, tried not to refer to past experiences, but it was a side of him that she would have had to accept sooner or later and it took them only a short while to get back to some of the old camaraderie from before. Like they were still friends who had great sex.

"Really? I mean, it's been five weeks, maybe it's starting to get a little old for you?"

That was something that was worrying her in a way. She was sure he wouldn't just lose interest and discard her like he did with the other girls. But the fire between them seemed so strong, she wondered if it would just burn out some day.

His expression suddenly became very serious. "Rachel, it will never ever get old. I love you."

Her heart skipped a beat and she stared at him with wide eyes.

"You… you love me?"

She'd never seen him so unsure, so nervous. He probably never put himself out there like that, setting himself up to get hurt. It was a first for him. Even if she hadn't known that before, seeing the look in his eyes, she would know it now. She was his first true love.

"Yes, I have been feeling that for a while now. I love you."

Happiness flooded her with the force of an incoming tide, washing away all the doubts and fears, the ifs and buts.

"I love you too, Joey. I do, I love you. The past five weeks have been amazing. I haven't been so happy in a very, very long time."

He smiled at her. A big, indescribably happy smile. Then he pulled her closer to him and put his arms around her, almost crushing her. "I've never been this happy ever, Rachel and if we didn't have to go to this wedding, I'd show you exactly what I feel for you."

Okay so, Monica was her best friend, but missing out on this? Really sucked.

"Do we really have to go to this wedding?"

He let go of her and tried hard to make a serious face.

"Let's think about it… the bride is your best friend, the groom is my best friend, I'm the minister, you're the maid of honor… I suppose - no."

She playfully swatted him against his chest. "Spoilsport!"

"Ouch!"

"Oh, did I hurt you, handsome? Come here, let me kiss it better."

She moved in to kiss him but he kept his distance. "I certainly expect you to kiss it better, but that will have to wait until after the wedding. Or at least after the ceremony."

There was a certain playfulness in his voice she was starting to recognize. Someone had obviously something up his sleeve. "What are you thinking?"

"The hotel has a very nice cozy room, where they keep the tablecloths and stuff, that would be just perfect for us."

She tried to hide a smile. "I don't even wanna know how you know about this."

"Hey, it was perfectly innocent. When Chandler showed me the place, I took the wrong door looking for the bathroom. And I thought it would be useful to remember where it is."

Of course he would.

In the past weeks he had gone to great lengths to make her 'catch up on my experiences', as he called it, and he wasn't limiting them to only their apartment. It was crazy sometimes but she would never have dreamed of how good it made her feel. It was exhilarating to just lose herself in him, to give in to her need for him, regardless of where they were. The thought alone, that she had almost chosen safety over this, was becoming unbearable. Even heartache was worth this.

She had become highly sensitive to every touch from him, to every nuance of his skilful lovemaking. It was like a new awareness, like she just discovered with what wide range of sensations her body was able to provide her. It felt like life itself was pulsing through her with every kiss he gave her, as if he had woken her up from a sleep.

"Hmm, sounds like this could be fun. Although…"

"What?"

There was something that had been bothering her for a while now. Sometimes their relationship still felt like an affair. Because they were hiding it from everyone. From their families and from their friends. And yes, they had decided together that it was okay for the time being, but now that she knew she was in love, she wanted to shout it from the rooftops.

"You know what would be fun too?"

"Just say it, Rach, we have to go in five minutes."

"Coming to that wedding arm in arm, kissing in public, sitting on your lap, dancing together really tight. Sneaking out and having sex in a dark closet and everyone knowing what we're doing."

"You want them to know about us?"

The happiness in his eyes told her that he'd wanted this for a long time already. "Yes, I want them to know about us."

"Even Ross?"

She wondered if he would ever completely lose his insecurity when it came to Ross. She wondered what she would have to do to convince him that she knew where she really wanted to be.

"Especially Ross."

"Rach, you don't know how much that means to me, but we can't do that today."

"Why not?" Of course she knew why. She just didn't want to wait.

"Remember how mad Monica got when you were stealing her thunder on her engagement day?"

"Oh, don't remind me of that."

"We'll tell them when they get back from their honeymoon, it's only ten days. And then we're Rachel and Joey."

"Joey and Rachel."

"Huh?"

"Joey and Rachel. Sounds better."

"I'll always put you first."

"I know. That's why I love you so much."

………

(present day – day 51 – seventh week of pregnancy)

As Joey was standing in front of the door to his apartment, he paused a while, thinking about what to say to Rachel, about what she would expect, how she would feel. But he couldn't imagine that, he didn't even know how he himself felt about her being pregnant. He knew how he felt about her though.

The days since Chandler and Monica's wedding had been wonderful. It was like in that movie they'd watched that one evening when Chandler and Monica wanted to have one last movie night as singles.

'The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.'

Okay, granted it was a bit cheesy and maybe he was becoming a sap, but he couldn't argue with the general statement. It was the greatest thing ever. It was like there was nothing more important than the two of them. They had made plans, talked about how to tell everyone, what to say to Ross. They fantasized about how it would be with everyone knowing about them.

With her, it was like it was becoming better with every day they were together. At first there was a bit of awkwardness when they settled into being a couple; there were things they thought they couldn't talk about anymore. But after a while, they'd started to get comfortable again, to be just themselves with added fun. They talked about the issues they'd tried to dodge before and they managed to figure out how to live with them.

When they finally found out they were in love, it felt like they were becoming more than just two people sleeping together. Suddenly he understood all the stuff Chandler kept telling him all the time. And now they were having a baby. He hoped Rachel could help him figure out what to do, what to feel.

When he stepped into the apartment, Rachel was pacing and looked up at him with tears in her eyes.

"What did they say?" she asked as soon as he had closed the door behind him.

"Nothing, they were pretty floored and I left a few seconds after you."

"God, that was _so_ not how I wanted them to learn about us."

"I know, Rach, but… it's too late now. Why didn't you throw that test in our trash? Didn't you want me to know?"

"I… I don't know, Joey! I don't know anything. I just know that when I looked into my calendar this morning I was so happy because we were going to tell everyone tomorrow and then could start to really be together; and then I realized that I was two weeks late already and now everything is upside down. Suddenly I'm pregnant and everyone has to figure out from that what's up with us and… I just don't know what to think… or what to feel. I can't deal with this, not now, not after everything just started to look as if it was perfect."

"We can still make it perfect, Rach. It was a bit unfortunate the way this went, but this isn't a bad thing, is it? I mean… we're having a baby."

A sudden jolt of happiness almost knocked him over. He was going to be a father. This was definitely a good thing, regardless of how unexpectedly it happened. Rachel was burying her face in her hands again, shaking her head and he'd never felt that painfully helpless in his entire life. This was so new for him and without her guidance, with her being so lost and confused, he felt lost as well. He took a few steps in her direction and kneeled down beside her.

"You think we should get married?"

The sudden look of horror on her face was the opposite of how he would've expected her to react.

"Married, Joey? Do you think this is what I want? Do you think I got pregnant to get you to marry me?"

"No … of course not," he said hastily. "I would never think something like that. I just…" he paused for a while, trying to get his thoughts at least a little bit in order. Failing at that, he decided that it might be best to just tell her how he felt. "I think I'm just as confused as you are. But I love you, that's not gonna change."

She looked up at him and tried to smile through her tears. Touching his face tenderly she said, "I love you too, Joe."

Another bout of happiness coursed through him at her words, but just when he wanted to take her in his arms, when he started to tell her that everything was going to be fine, that he would always be there for her, she suddenly got up.

"I have to go to work."

"It's Sunday, Rachel," he stated bewildered.

His words didn't keep her from grabbing her jacket and heading for the door.

"I need to think, I have to get out of here for a while."

"Rach, it's getting dark outside, I can't let you wander around alone."

"Joey, please don't start to tell me what to do. I need to think and I can't do that here. Please, you know that."

The memory of the results of the last time she needed to think forced him to nod his head in reluctant consent. When the door shut behind her, something occurred to him. Something she might consider to do. His blood turned cold with indescribable terror. He sprinted to the door, ripped it open and bolted into the hallway.

Rachel was about to walk down the stairs and turned to him with a questioning look.

"Just… please… don't think about… not keeping her," Joey said breathlessly.

Her hand went to her belly in the universally known protective gesture of an expecting mother. "I would never do that."

Overwhelming relief washed through him at that and he couldn't have thought of a single thing that would've mattered more to him right at this moment. "That's all I need to know."

* * *

tbc 


	4. TOW Joey finds out

**Chapter 4 - TOW Joey finds out**

(Day 52 – seventh week of pregnancy)

Joey knew now how it felt to go insane. It was almost six in the morning and Rachel hadn't come home yet. He had tried her cell phone, only to find out she had left it at home, which was the point when he really started to get worried. That was more than six hours ago. Since then he had paced the apartment, contemplating looking for her, but in the end had opted against that in case she called or came home, or someone else called and told him where she was.

At three in the morning he started to call the hospitals and the police, trying to find out if there was an accident in which she was involved, but so far, none of the unidentified women that had accidents that night matched Rachel's description. Not that this put his mind at ease.

There was a plethora of possibilities that could've happened to her. He alternated between cursing himself for letting her go and being angry at her for going. He tried not to care and then jumped at every noise that sounded remotely like a key turning in the lock. He prayed that she would be all right, and then he hurt himself when he slammed his fist against the wall in an attempt to vent his frustration. In the quiet moments, when he had himself almost convinced that she was all right, that he would've heard something already if anything had happened to her, he thought about the baby.

Their baby.

But the faint happiness he always felt when he thought about this was quickly overshadowed by a feeling of indescribable dread simmering in the pit of his stomach. He just knew that something terrible had happened that night. Something that could destroy everything he cared about. He tried not to give into the despair, the hopelessness this feeling was causing, but it got harder with every passing minute.

A few minutes past seven he decided to go over to Monica's. Maybe it was as simple as that, maybe she just spent the night at Monica's for whatever reason. He knew she hadn't been at Phoebe's, he had called her at about four in the morning. She had been pissed at first, but after telling her that Rachel hadn't come home yet, she was as concerned as he was. Calling Monica was something he hadn't dared to do. If Rachel was there, he would find out soon enough, if not, he would've interrupted their sleep for nothing.

When he went over to the other apartment, the door was open and Monica and Chandler sat in the kitchen having breakfast.

"Hi, big daddy," Chandler greeted him cheerfully, smiling as brightly at him as Monica.

When he barely smiled back, they seemed to pick up on the fact that something was wrong. "God, you look like hell, Joey. What's wrong?"

"Rachel went for a walk last night after… you know, everything came out… and she hasn't come back."

The happy smiles vanished from both Chandler's and Monica's faces and Monica jumped up from her seat.

"Oh my God, did you have a fight?"

"No, no," Joey said hastily, shaking his head. "I mean… we didn't talk that much. Rachel was pretty upset about how everything happened and she said she needed to think… and… and then she left."

"She was upset about being pregnant?"

"Not just about that. We… we wanted to tell you guys about us today and… the way you learned about this wasn't how we had imagined it would be."

"How long have you been together anyway?" Monica asked while Chandler got up from the table and walked over to him too.

Joey didn't need to think about the answer. "Seven weeks," he said, a hint of a smile brightening his gloomy expression.

"It's serious, huh?" Chandler asked, picking up on this faint signal of happiness.

"Yeah, it is," Joey answered, and for a moment, he let himself revel in that thought, in that feeling, in the relief of knowing that he didn't need to hide something as important as this from his best friend anymore. "Even if it wasn't for the baby…" he trailed of, realizing that he might never be able to find the right words to express what he felt for Rachel. "I love her, I really do," he simply said after a few moments. "I can't imagine being with anyone else ever again."

Chandler and Monica smiled again.

"This is so amazing," Monica finally whispered, sounding slightly weepy. "And you're going to have a baby. I mean… congratulations, we're so happy for you."

Joey smiled faintly and nodded, but turned serious again seconds later.

"I haven't really dealt with that yet. I just wish she was here."

"So you have no idea where she is?" Chandler inquired.

Joey let his shoulders slump. "I kinda hoped she would be here."

"No, she isn't," Monica stated what had been obvious the moment he had stepped into the apartment. "And we probably wouldn't have let her stay here," she continued. "We would've sent her back to you. Did you try … not that I think something bad happened … but did you try calling the hospitals?"

He sighed defeated.

"Hospitals, police stations… her work, Phoebe… I'm going to call her parents in a few minutes… but it feels like I'm running out of options."

Worry and concern was now deeply etched into their features when Monica lightly touched Joey's arm and asked, "Did you even sleep last night, Joey?"

"Seriously, Mon? How could I?" Joey snapped, instantly sorry for his tone but unable to help it. "The woman I love is missing," he continued more gently.

"Okay, Joe, here's what we do. You take this cup of coffee, sit down for a while and I'll call Rachel's parents. Both of them. And then we'll think about what to do next, okay?"

"Thanks… but… no coffee… I have a feeling it might make me sick. I need… to know where Rachel is, I can't eat or drink anything right now."

"You sure Joey? Your body isn't used to going without food for so long. You're gonna pass out if you keep doing this."

"I'm okay, Chan, let's just… find Rachel."

He walked over to the big window, staring out, willing Rachel to miraculously appear somewhere.

And she did.

He saw her standing in Ross's apartment, looking around. It felt like an incredibly heavy weight was lifted off his shoulders and he heaved a loud sigh of relief. She was all right. Thank God she was all right.

After the first wave of relief had washed through him, though, he noticed other things.

Rachel was wearing what appeared to be Ross's shirt. She came out of Ross's bedroom and now she was trying to pick up her clothes that were strewn around the whole living room, mixed up with some of Ross's. There was no mistaking what had happened there last night.

No mistaking.

His breath hitched and his heartbeat began to slow down to what felt like a stop. Something cold and steely wrapped itself around his chest and was pressing it together mercilessly. His lungs started to burn because apparently he hadn't taken a breath for some time.

And then he saw her turn her head, looking right at him. Her eyes went wide as saucers and he could see a toneless 'no' forming on her lips. This was the moment the agony started. An insanely intense pain, slicing through him, cutting him open, making him bleed. Another pain faintly registered in the back of his head when his knees hit the floor and he doubled over, clutching the place over his heart, where it hurt the most. He felt Chandler coming up behind him, touching his shoulder.

"Joey, buddy, what …? Oh no … no … God, Joey, I am so … so sorry."

Chandler kneeled beside him, putting an arm around him. "Chandler, what's with him?" Monica asked crouching down on his other side.

"You might wanna take a look at your brother's apartment."

"Oh no! No. How could she …?"

"Mon, there is something really wrong with Joey here."

Monica turned her attention back from the window to Joey, touching his face. "Joey, I'm so sorry. I don't know what to say."

Joey could feel Chandler getting worried. "Joey, please, say something. What's with you? Can you hear me? Please."

He could hear him but he couldn't answer, it was like everything he did would cause him even more pain, moving, talking, even breathing. The exhaustion from last night's lack of sleep seemed to catch up with him, he could feel the darkness tugging at his consciousness, promising him the oblivion of sleep, promising him to end the pain if he would just let himself fall into nothingness. There was no fight in him anymore, so he just let go.

"Mon, he's getting so cold, he's shaking so hard. What is happening to him?"

"I think he goes into shock, we have to…"

The darkness that embraced him drowned out everything that was said after that.

* * *

tbc 


	5. TOW Rachel realizes what she has done

**TOW Rachel realizes what she has done**

In every person's life there are places that are remembered with a special fondness. With love even. Places where you were happy. Places that were lost to you for one reason or the other.

Your grandmother's house. The playground you used to play on with the neighbors' kids that you liked so much. Sometimes you ache to be there again because you loved it so much. You ache to be there again because life was so much simpler back then. You were happy, you had no problems, and everything seemed clear and easy. Now your life isn't easy anymore. There are problems, more questions than answers, there are uncertainties and doubts.

But when you have the chance to go back to the old playground, you'll find that being at that place changes nothing. Because the place can't make you happy anymore. You've grown out of it. When you run your hands over the slightly rusty climbing frame you realize it wouldn't be fun anymore to climb up there. Maybe you would even hurt yourself.

When you're sitting on the swing, you find that your legs are too long now to sit comfortably. You tilt your head towards the sky you thought you could reach when you were a child. But you realize that this old swing won't bring you close to the clouds anymore. Now there are other things that make you fly.

When you go back to your car, to drive back to the life you're leading now, when you're looking back one last time, it's a bittersweet moment. You know now that your past can't make you happy anymore. In a way, it is sad. But it also frees you to look for happiness in the life you have now, to look not back but forward. You pull your car out of the parking lot and a flash of happiness strikes you unexpectedly. You look forward to going home again.

* * *

(Day 52 – seventh week of pregnancy) 

Rachel woke up with a smile. She slowly sat up on the bed and put her hand on her lower abdomen, trying to make contactwith the child growing inside of her. She couldn't even comprehend anymore how frightening the thought of having a baby had seemed a couple of hours ago. Now it just made her happy.

'We're going home now, sweetie. To daddy. He is…'

A sudden realization hit her, knocking the breath out of her.

"Oh my God."

He was waiting. She'd left him about ten hours ago and he was probably going crazy worrying about her. Spinning around she caught sight of Ross, snoring peacefully. Another gut wrenching realization almost rendered her unable to move. This would kill Joey.

She had known she was making a mistake the minute she stopped pretending to still be in love with Ross, but up until now it had felt as if this mistake was only affecting her. But it was devastatingly clear that this wasn't true.

"Ross… Ross… wake up, come on, wake up!"

Ross looked at her with half-lidded eyes.

"Whassup, Rachel?" he mumbled sleepily.

"No one must know about what we did, okay? I mean the whole having sex thing. I came over last night but we just talked and you slept on your couch, all right? You can't talk about this to anyone, ever."

"You're gonna lie to Joey about this?"

"I shouldn't have done this. It was bad and totally wrong. I'm going to have that on my conscience for the rest of my life. But Joey... this would hurt him so bad and it isn't worth that. I'm not gonna let this hurt Joey and the baby."

She scrambled off the bed and looked for her clothes. Figured, she left them all in the living room. Cursing her stupidity for getting herself into this, she quickly slipped into a t-shirt that lay on the floor and headed for the living room. After she had found her bra and her blouse, she felt as if someone was watching her. She turned around slowly, indescribable terror crawling up inside of her. Looking up, she stared right into the eyes of the one person she so desperately had wanted to never know about this.

"No," she breathed, wishing she could reach out to him, touch him, tell him she loved him and only him, begging him not to let what he saw affect him.

"No," she said a bit louder when he disappeared from the window.

When Chandler came to the window, looking shortly at her and then disappearing as well, her 'no' was a painful wail that got her Ross's attention.

"Rach, what is it, everything okay?"

He came up behind her in the moment Monica stood at the window for a moment, disappearing as fast as her husband. "NO!" she cried and sank to the floor, sobbing.

"Rachel, was he... did he... did Joey see you?"

She nodded mutely, the image of the look of pain and horror on Joey's face burning a hole into her heart.

"I'm so sorry, Rach. I didn't want it to come to this ... I didn't mean to screw that up for you. I just wanted you to be happy... I... Oh my God, Joey's gonna hate me."

Ross's defeated rambling gave her back her spirit somehow; it always had. It was like when he was weak, she had to be strong. She wiped the tears off her face and got up.

"I'll go talk to him. I'll tell him what happened. He'll understand, he has to. He said he loves me, if he does, he'll understand. Everything's gonna be okay."

Ross looked at her incredulously. "You really think he's gonna be cool about this? I mean..."

"Everything's gonna be okay. It has to," she repeated more to herself than to Ross while dressing herself hurriedly.

… … …

A few minutes later she knocked at Monica's door desperately. Monica opened but not enough for her to come in.

"Mon, please where is Joey? I need to talk to him."

"You can't talk to him now, Rachel."

Monica stepped into the hall, closing the door behind her. She gestured for Rachel to go into Joey's apartment.

"Please, Monica, where is he? Did he go anywhere? I really need to talk to him."

Monica's face was closed off and borderline angry.

"Like I said, you can't talk to him now, Rachel. He's in your old room. Chandler is with him."

Rachel tried frantically to make sense of what her friend was saying. "What's he doing in my old room?"

"We're going to let him stay there until… until you move out."

Nothing of what she said was making any sense.

"But, Monica, I don't want to move out. I want to stay with him here. Why should I want to move out?"

That apparently tested Monica's patience a bit too much. "Because you cheated on him with your ex-boyfriend, because you broke his heart, because you left him a sobbing mess in my apartment."

Understanding painfully dawned on her and she stepped back a bit, clinging to the kitchen counter to hold herself upright. "He… he cried?"

"No, he didn't cry. He broke down. I had to give him a pill to get him to stop shaking."

"It was so bad?" she asked tonelessly, dreading the answer.

"What did you expect, Rachel? You left him totally confused after you had barely talked about the baby at all, he was up all night going insane with worry because you didn't come back and then he sees you coming out of Ross's bedroom. Honestly, how do you think he should've taken this?"

She pressed her free hand over her mouth to stop herself from crying but there seemed to be not much she could do about that.

"Oh my God, what have I done?"

"Seriously, Rachel? I have no idea. I know you're pregnant and I know you're confused and that this isn't how you wanted it to be, but what you did… I mean, I can barely stand to talk to you right now after what you did to Joey. And if I were you, I would stay out of Chandler's way for the time being. What the hell were you thinking?"

Her knees gave way under her and she slid to the floor, resting her head against the kitchen counter. "I suppose I wasn't," she whispered weakly.

Monica crouched down beside her and looked at her worried and with a bit of compassion in her eyes. "Did you want to get back together with Ross?" she asked her softly.

"No, I didn't. I don't even know why I ended up in his apartment, let alone in his bed. Maybe I needed to get closure, so I could leave all of that finally in the past. It made me realize… truly and deeply realize… how much I wanted to be with Joey, that I can't imagine being with anyone else than him – ever."

She noticed how saying that gave her back a bit of her strength, a bit of her will to pull through, tolet it not devastate her completely.

"So you needed to sleep with Ross to find out that you love Joey, is that what you're saying?"

"No, I already knew I loved him. It was like closing a door that was standing open for far too long. It made me realize that he – and only he – is the man I want to spend the rest of my life with."

"I hate to tell you this, Rachel, but what you did last night probably destroyed every chance at having what seems now so important to you. I think you've lost him."

"I can't lose him, Monica. Apart from loving him so much, I'm having his baby. I can't do this alone. I wouldn't know how to do this alone."

A wave of desperation was threatening to crush her at that thought. Her child was going to grow up without its father; she was going to have to live without the man she loved.

"I am sure he's not gonna let you do this alone. But I doubt he will ever be more to you than the father of your child."

This couldn't be happening; there was no way she would let that happen. She had to fight. Not just for her happiness, but for the happiness of her child.

"I have to talk to him, Monica. Maybe he can forgive me. Maybe I can make him see that I left everything with Ross in the past now. Maybe we can be happy again. Please, Monica, tell him I want to talk, I need to. Please."

Monica looked far too sad for her comfort. She looked as if she thought her hopes were pointless. But she wasn't even going to consider that.

"I'll tell him that. But you stay here and wait until he comes to you on his own."

Rachel acknowledged that with a short nod and got up again. "I'll wait," she said, trying to sound confident but mostly failing at it.

Monica looked at her for a while and then she started to smile a little.

"I don't even know if I should tell you how great I think it is that you're having a baby."

Rachel smiled back weakly.

"When I woke up this morning, I was so happy…" she whispered, trying to come up with a description for how she was feeling now. Truth was, she had no idea.

Monica looked at her searchingly for a while and then she put her hand on Rachel's cheek, comfortingly caressing her.

"You gonna be okay?"

"I don't know," Rachel gave back honestly.

………

After Monica had left she stood in the middle of the apartment for a while, just staring at the wall. At the wall where everything had started.

She wished she could go back to this day, to the day when everything was all right and easy. On the other hand, going back was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place.

She hadn't planned to, it had just happened.

………

(Flashback to the night before - day 51)

She wandered along the dark and slightly damp streets not registering what went on around her. She barely noticed where she was going.

Her thoughts were in maddening disarray. Scraps of conversation echoed through her head, but evaded her when she tried to use them to form a coherent thought. And questions, thousands of questions. Would she be able to do this, would she be capable to raise a kid, to be a good mother? What about her relationship to Joey? Would it be able to withstand the changes a child was going to bring for them?

Seven weeks, another thought ran through her head. They had been together for seven weeks. She had dated guys and not even seen their apartment after seven weeks. Of course it was different with Joey, she had known him for years, they had been living together for over a year, it wasn't like this was all new, but… a baby?

She tried to recall Joey's face when he had found out, she remembered shock and confusion and even some sort of sadness. But then again, he'd wanted her to keep the baby. He'd said that, whatever it meant. A painful jab went through her as she remembered his words. Did this mean he hadn't even trusted her that far? Did it mean he didn't know how much he meant to her, how much she wanted to see if they could work, if this was something real?

She stopped walking and looked around herself. She had been going in a circle, she was almost were she had started. And sadly enough, not just as far as walking around went.

Looking over to their apartment, she saw the warm light shining out of the windows of their living room. He was waiting for her. A warm feeling went through her at that, making her smile a bit.

Maybe, maybe this wasn't as bad as it seemed.

But then she realized where exactly she was standing.

It was the front door of Ross's apartment building. She wondered how he had taken this, what he thought about this. If she was honest to herself, she knew that he was hurting. There was no way he was taking that lightly.

Maybe she should talk to him. Maybe it would be a good thing, a necessary step into the right direction. Clear things up with Ross, closing the door to the past, opening the one to the future. And on top of that, she really needed to talk to someone who knew how it felt to know you will soon be having the responsibility for another human being. For your own flesh and blood, for your child.

………

She stood in front of his door for five minutes before she could work up the courage to knock. She told herself that there was no real reason for her to be afraid, but on the other hand, she knew that being the one to hurt Ross had always hurt her too, even if she would never have admitted to that. It was a bond she had never been able to cut completely

It took a while for him to open up after she had knocked and when he saw her, his expression went from sad, to surprised to closed off in a matter of seconds.

"What do you want, Rachel? Shouldn't you be with your boyfriend right now?" Ross mumbled gruffly and she had to keep a sliver of anger from interfering with what she was intending to say.

"I want to talk to you, Ross. I think I need to."

Reluctantly he opened the door further and let her step into his apartment. She took a seat on his couch and he slowly sat down too, still looking wary and slightly angry.

"So you and Joey, huh? How long has this been going on?" he asked before she could start with the speech Joey and her had prepared for this exact occasion.

"Seven weeks," she answered and before she could add anything else, Ross let out a fake laugh.

"Whohoo, just the right time to think about starting a family, isn't it?"

"It's not like we have planned this…" she said defensively and the anger came back again.

"Well, I know Joey isn't the brightest star in the sky, but I always figured he knew how to use a condom."

Handling Ross's arrogance was something she always had been bad at.

"They're only ninety seven percent safe," she sniped back. The she took a deep breath and tried to take the high road again. "And… Ross, this isn't the point."

"So, then what _is_ the point, Rachel?" Ross asked with his voice raised. "What were you coming here for? To share your happiness?"

It dawned on her that this might have been a mistake. She couldn't handle this, any of this. She couldn't handle his pain and his anger, not while still trying to get a grip on her own emotional turmoil.

"Ross… you're… you're not making this easy," she said in a quivering voice, feeling tears sting in her eyes.

Ross was oblivious to her distress. "Am I supposed to?" he asked in a cuttingly sarcastic tone.

"I didn't give you such a hard time about Emily," she gave back, on the verge of yelling, hating herself for sounding like a sulking child.

But her irritation about herself quickly turned into anger at Ross when he said, "You gave me a hard time about Chloe."

Her eyes widened and for a while, she couldn't even find the right words.

"How dare you!" she finally exploded, "This is completely different. I didn't cheat on you with him."

"You weren't exactly forthcoming with the truth either," Ross gave back, infuriatingly calm. "Both of you."

The thinly veiled accusation let all her anger drain out of her in an instant. In a way, he was right. They should've told him sooner. It was unfair that he had to find out like this.

"We were going to tell you tomorrow," she mumbled, guilt forcing her to look down at the floor.

"Well, if you say so."

Ross's self-righteous condescension inflamed her fury once again.

"Really, I can't believe you have the nerve to even compare this. Let's compare, shall we? You had a one-night stand with some girl you picked up in a bar, _two hours_ after we _supposedly_ broke up. You and I are over for five years and now you're mad at me because I'm in love with a man I've known for seven years and whom I'm having a baby with?"

"Y…y… you… you love him?"

Only after she'd thrown an angry "Of course I do!" into his face, did she notice the change in his demeanor. She watched him staggering backwards, as if someone had delivered a mighty blow to his stomach. His back hit the wall and he slumped against it.

A little worried, she got up and stepped to him, watching with growing alarm how his face went deathly pale and tears started swimming in his eyes. It was clear that this was the exact moment he realized what was really happening. That he had lost her, that there was no getting back together. That it was over – forever.

Unsure about what to do, she gently put her hand on his face, softly stroking him. When the first tears left his eyes and rolled down his cheeks, a soft sobbing alerted her to the fact that she was crying too.

"Ross," she pleaded in a tear-saturated voice. "Ross… please… don't cry."

He tried to turn his face away from her hands, but she didn't let him. She wanted to help, she wanted to comfort him. And she felt that she could use a little comfort herself.

She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him to her. He followed her willingly, burying his face into the crook of her neck, sending a flash of familiar warmth through her.

"Ross," she breathed, suddenly overwhelmed by a flood of memories.

Still trying to comfort him, she kissed his hair, then the side of his face. When he turned his head a little, she kissed his cheek. After he had turned his face to her fully, she saw that he had stopped crying and looked at her with wide eyes. She leaned in and pressed a light kiss on his lips.

A jolt went through him at that but he seemed oddly paralyzed, so she kissed him again. And then, as if she had unleashed something inside of him, he kissed her back. He put his hand in her hair and held her against him, kissing her with a sweetness that awakened one year's worth of memories, most of them good.

She allowed herself to be taken in by those memories, to let herself carried away by them. Away from the questions, from the doubts and the worries. Back to a time, where life had been simple, where the future was clearcut and happy. A sudden yearning to have that back overwhelmed her so forcefully, she was powerless against it. If only things could be so easy again…

She pulled back and smiled at Ross. "Gunther drove me crazy the whole day with his constant telling me where the used cups have to go and that I have to clean the cappuccino machine… I'm so glad this day is over."

There was a weird brightness to Ross's gaze, but there was also some sort of happiness, of calm.

"I had a sucky day at the museum, too," he finally said. "I mean, it's 1996 and people still seem to have no understanding about evolution at all."

"How about we make each other forget about this horrible day?" she breathed seductively, her lips brushing over his.

"Very good idea, Rachel," he whispered back and closed the remaining space between their lips with a passionate kiss.

(A while later)

Rachel carefully drew the comforter up to her neck, suddenly feeling weird about Ross seeing her naked.

"Awkward, huh?" Ross said, blushing, and she nodded.

Then again, as awkward as it felt, it was a relief. Maybe things had been supposed to happen that way, maybe it was a good thing that it had happened that way. It gave everything a definite sense of finality, it gave them closure.

"So you really love him?" Ross spoke up again, trying to break the silence that seemed to feel uncomfortable to him. It didn't feel uncomfortable to her. She was safely tucked under a warm blanket and suddenly very tired.

"Yeah, I do," she answered, smiling. "I really do."

Ross shook his head. "Who would've thought?"

Since he didn't seem to expect her to say something to this, she closed her eyes and started drifting.

"God, you're gonna have a baby," she heard Ross say softly and it made her smile. "I guess I'm just realizing what this really means. You and Joey… and the baby… you're gonna be a family."

"Yes we are," she whispered back, beautiful pictures of the three of them walking towards a golden red sunset flashing behind her eyelids. "I'm just realizing that myself," she added almost inaudibly, as if saying that only to herself.

Silence stretched between them for a while, drawing her even deeper into her half-dream like state. But then, chuckling lightly, Ross suddenly asked, "So what is it about Joey?" His tone was light and friendly, and when she looked at him she could see no traces of malice or anger in it. It was like all of a sudden, they had left everything behind. It was an immensely comforting feeling. "Is it the good looks?" Ross kept asking teasingly. "Is it because he's a soap opera star, is it because he's good in bed…"

A soft chuckle came from her at that and she playfully swatted Ross's arm.

"Ross!" she chided, "Do you think I'm that shallow?"

He gave her a look that implied as much and made her chuckle again. Then she sighed dramatically and said, "Well, he is… all of that."

Ross just smirked and said nothing, apparently waiting for her to elaborate.

"But of course it's not just that. It's… see, with him, there are no limits, no boundaries, no pretences. When I'm with him, I feel as if nothing could ever hold me back," she mused quietly.

Ross looked slightly hurt.

"You felt like I was holding you back?"

"Not back then. Back then you were everything I ever wanted. If we hadn't broken up, it would have been enough for me for the rest of my life. But I'm not the woman thatI was five years ago, anymore . Even if it wasn't for Joey…" she paused for a while, looking at Ross's open expression and finally feeling that she could tell him what she was about to say, "Even if it wasn't for Joey, I could never go back to what we had."

"I just… I always thought we'd end up together. For years I imagined us getting married some day."

"You have no idea for how long I imagined us getting married, Ross."

"Well I guess you stopped after… Chloe, right? That's the one mistake you couldn't forgive me for. I ruined everything for us with this."

"Ross, I forgave you for that a long time ago. But the moment I stopped seeing you in my future, was the moment I stood at the gate in Athens, realizing I was on your honeymoon, while you were somewhere else, trying to save your marriage… to another woman."

"It's been over since then?"

"Wasn't it for you, Ross? I mean… you loved her… you wanted to marry her."

"Maybe you should've told me about your feelings back then. Maybe then I wouldn't have married her."

"Do you think you wouldn't have married her if I had told you about my feelings?"

"I guess…"

"See, this is the difference between you and me. Even if you still loved me, it wouldn't change a thing about me wanting to be with Joey. Because… because I love him."

While Ross silently contemplated this, Rachel closed her eyes again. Her twirling thoughts had finally given way to an even, silent stream of warm and peaceful feelings and she contentedly listened to Ross dissecting his current love life, assessing his chances on the dating market as a man three times divorced.

Or at least that was the last thing she was aware of.

(End flashback)

* * *

tbc 


	6. TOW the day after

A/N: As alway, huge thanks to my reviewers. You guys are the best. As for 'happily ever after', well, let's say JnR have to sort through a big mess before that can happen. Still, there's always flashbacks for a bit of JnR lovin'. ;)

* * *

**TOW the day after**

(Day 52 – seventh week of pregnancy – evening)

When Joey opened his eyes, feeling refreshed and calm, he looked into Chandler's smiling face.

"Hey, welcome back, buddy. You had us really worried for a moment."

Joey wondered what Chandler was talking about. He had no idea how he got into this bed and what had happened. Then he tried to piece it together. Rachel is pregnant. Wow, he was going to be a dad. The thought made him smile. But … then, she went away, she was unhappy. He was worried and then he looked for her at Monica's and then… He sucked in a deep, painful breath when all the events came rushing back to him, hitting him with a relentless brutality. He squeezed his eyes shut and curled together tightly.

"Joey … Joseph … please, look at me. Goddammit, look at me!"

Chandler's commands actually made him open his eyes again, looking into the blue eyes of his friend that showed so much concern for him.

"Joey, I can't imagine how much you must hurt right now, but you have to calm down. You can't keep having these breakdowns, okay? We gave you a sedative, you should … you should be able to … calm down somehow, please. Try to get a grip, for the sake of your sanity."

"How could she do that, Chandler? Why?"

"I have no idea, Joe. I don't understand that either."

"We… we were so happy. And… we're going to have a baby… why…"

A sob tore itself free from his chest. Followed by another one. He pressed his fist against his mouth, trying to stop the pitiful display of emotional vulnerability. Chandler sat down on the side of the bed and put an arm around him.

"Maybe letting it out helps, Joey. I'm not gonna tell anyone."

If someone had told him, that one day he would find himself in Chandler's arms, crying like a baby, clinging to his friend like a lifeline, he would've laughed right into their face. But here he was, doing exactly that, unable to stop the tears. When the sobs died down a bit, Chandler drew back and wordlessly handed him a box of tissues.

"Feeling better?"

"Not really. I think I've never felt worse. Look what she turned me into. I can't believe she did this to me… to us… to the baby. Maybe I did something…"

"Hey Joe, stop with the guilt trip right there. It's not your fault. Whatever you did or said, she had no right to do this. No right. And if anyone should know that perfectly well, it's her. It is NOT your fault."

"Yeah, I guess you're right. God… this is all so much… I can't deal with it… I'm so tired…"

"That's probably the pill Monica gave you. She said it would make you sleepy."

"It feels like I have cotton wool in my head. And I know that's what you think is in there anyway."

Chandler chuckled. "I wouldn't have said it. Besides, I think you're a lot smarter than you want me to believe."

Joey had already drifted off to sleep. Chandler tucked the comforter around his friend and left the room.

Monica was in the living room, pacing nervously while trying to reach her brother on the phone. When she saw him coming out of Joey's room, she stopped and put the phone to the side.

"How is he?"

Chandler shook his head sadly. "I've never seen him so miserable. I'm kinda glad Rachel didn't try to come here, I would've forgotten myself."

When he turned around, rubbing his forehead, Monica said quietly, "She did."

"What?" Chandler asked, sharply turning back.

"Before, when Joey started to cry, she came here, wanting to talk to him."

"What is she, crazy?" Chandler asked exasperated. "Does she even realize what she did to him?"

"Not at first," Monica answered with a helpless shrug. "She was totally out of it. When I told her how badly Joey had taken this, it was like she just realized what exactly she had done, that she might lose him. She was pretty close to breaking down herself."

"Monica, I think women should never get pregnant if it makes them go insane like this. And Ross… Mon, I know he's your brother, but what was he thinking? He knew she was pregnant with Joey's baby, what the hell possessed him to sleep with her?"

"I have no idea, Chandler. I wish I did."

………

When Joey shuffled out of his room the next morning, Monica was preparing breakfast for him. Chandler was already at work and she felt a bit unsure about how to talk to him.

"Morning, Mon. Or let's say, I hope it's morning."

"It is. Why don't you take a shower and have breakfast afterwards," she said with an encouraging smile.

"I can't. All of my stuff is… over there."

He gestured vaguely in the direction of the door and looked down at his feet sadly. Suddenly Monica was very glad to have thought of that before.

"I brought some of your things here. Toiletry and a few fresh clothes. The bag is right next to the bathroom door."

That wasn't quite the truth; it wasn't her who had put all the things in the bag. She had wanted Chandler to do that, but having him alone in the same room with Rachel didn't seem like such a good idea, so shehad goneover herself and had asked Rachel to pack some of Joey's stuff. Rachel had cried the whole time. Before Monica had left the apartment, Rachel had gone back to Joey's room to get something else.

"Joey can't sleep without him," she'd said after coming back with Hugsy, hugging the soft toy to herself before giving it to Monica.

By then Monica had beenclose to tears herself. If she had doubted what Rachel felt for Joey before, now she didn't anymore.

While she was thinking about that, Joey came back, Hugsy in his hand. "You didn't bring him."

Monica looked down guiltily. "She did. She said you can't sleep without him."

Joey looked at Hugsy and it seemed to Monica as if he was getting angry. He discarded the penguin on the couch and made his way to the bathroom. "I wish she'd known that I can't sleep without her."

Monica took a deep breath and cursed the situation she was in the middle of. She cared for all of them, for Joey, for Rachel and of course for Ross. To know they were all locked in this dreadful situation was depressing. She had no idea how this situation could ever be resolved with their unique friendship still intact. Who was she kidding? The friendship was already damaged beyond repair.

Joey came out of the bathroom twenty minutes later, still on rather wobbly legs.

"Whoa … Monica. That stuff you gave me yesterday has me still feeling drunk somehow. I can barely remember my name, let alone the lines I'm supposed to say today at DOOL."

"I doubt it's the pill, Joey. You're through some pretty bad stuff and on top of that, you probably haven't eaten a thing in twenty four hours."

He was lost in thought for a while. "Yeah, you're right. The last time I ate something was the night… you know… when…"

It was painful to see him struggling with words like that. He obviously couldn't even bring himself to say Rachel's name, or to talk about what happened. He surely shouldn't do that before eating something.

"When we told you guys about our honeymoon," she helped him out. "Then it's thirty six. Sit down and eat. It's a miracle you're still standing."

After wolfing down some of the food she had prepared for him, the color came back to his cheeks and he smiled thankfully at her.

"Thanks, Mon, you guys are the best."

He pushed his plate away from him and leaned his head in his hands. "My head is still pounding."

"Like I said, you've been through a lot. We were seconds away from calling 911 after you all but stopped breathing. You were cold as a corpse and shaking so hard, we didn't know what to do. You only started to breathe normally again when you lost consciousness."

Joey chuckled mirthlessly at that. "I guess I would've been the first guy brought into an ER with a broken heart. God… that's so embarrassing."

"Why's that embarrassing? Remember when I broke up with Richard? I was walking around like a ghost for weeks. You took the blow at once. You'll see… you'll be back on your feet in no time."

"Mon, I didn't just lose a girl. I lost… my future."

Again Monica had to fight back tears at seeing him this way. She took his hands in hers and desperately tried to find something encouraging to say. "Maybe it's not lost. Maybe things can somehow… work again."

"How can they, Mon? She is… with him now."

Monica shook her head.

"No Joey, she isn't. She is sitting over there in your apartment crying her eyes out over losing you. She wants to talk to you."

That made Joey look at her in surprise. "Really? Why didn't she come here?"

"I didn't want her to, I wanted you to get some rest after what happened. Besides, Chandler would've probably ripped her to pieces. I told her to wait until you're ready to talk."

Joey jumped up from his chair and started pacing. "What did she say, Mon?"

"She said a lot of things. Mostly stuff I think she should tell you in person. But she is sorry and when I told her you might want her to move out, she was devastated."

It almost startled Monica how decisive and fast Joey's reaction to that came.

"I don't want her to move out."

Monica looked down at her plate sadly for a while and then she looked up again, her voice was pleading and soft.

"Joe, please don't think I want to tell you or Rachel what to do. But I talked with Chandler about it. We don't think it's gonna be a good idea for you two to keep living together. At least not for the time being. You can stay here as long as you want, or as long as Rachel needs to find a new place."

Joey's shoulders slumped and he looked even more tortured than before.

"Do you really think I should throw the mother of my child out of my apartment?"

"Joey, I can't tell you what to do," Monica said with a sigh. "You have to decide that for yourself. Maybe when you talk to her, you'll know how you feel about having her around all the time."

The pacing started again and finally he stopped, standing in front of the big window, staring over at Ross's apartment just like he had yesterday. Monica got up from her seat and walked over to him, gently placing her hand on his back, comfortingly stroking him.

"God, this is so messed up," Joey whispered after a long while, his gaze never leaving the spot he was staring at. "Two days ago I was thinking my biggest problem was how to tell Ross about us being together."

"You wanted to tell him first?"

"Yes, we did. We knew he might take it badly."

"He did," Monica said with a nod, taking a step back from him. "When you two left the room after… you know… that night, he was furious. He kept talking about her being the love of his life and that he can't just let her go."

At that Joey suddenly spun around to her, his eyes ablaze.

"But he did, Monica," he said with a certain urgency. As if he had to convince himself of what he was saying. "He let her go. It's been five years since they broke up." He paused and shook his head sadly. "I mean, yeah, I felt hellishly guilty about being together with her, about doing this to him, about jeopardizing our friendship. You know how important stuff like that is for me. If I had known how much Ross was still hung up on her before we got together, I might not even have done anything. But the minute I learned about… the pregnancy, that became the most important thing for me. And I'm convinced it should've changed things for him as well. Can you understand that?"

"Of course I can, Joe. We told Ross more or less the same thing that night. I still have no idea why he didn't listen to us."

Joey looked at her for a second and then he turned to the window again.

"God…" he started to talk again, his tear saturated whisper almost bringing tears to Monica's eyes. "I mean... she is pregnant. There is my child inside of her and he… he did… how could he even do that?" He looked at her as if he expected her to have an answer to that. When she had none, he continued, "How could she let him?"

Monica let out a troubled sigh and took his hand, squeezing it reassuringly.

"I guess you have to ask her that question, Joey."

* * *

tbc 

Review, pretty please.


	7. TOW Joey and Rachel talk

A/N: Big thanks to my faithful reviewers. Hope you'll like the next chapter as well.

* * *

**TOW Joey and Rachel talk**

(Day 53 – seventh week of pregnancy)

Joey thought he might have discovered what he had always run from. It had to be this. He had never been afraid of commitment, of responsibility. He had been afraid of getting so close that someone could hurt him.

Before, girls had cheated on him, had left him – not very often, but it had happened – but it never took more than a beer and a pizza to deal with that. Now, when he had finally allowed himself to get close enough to fall in love, he had his heart smashed into a million pieces.

He had no idea how to deal with that. With her. Maybe Monica was right, maybe he should talk to her. Maybe they could figure it out somehow. After all, Monica had said Rachel was sorry.

Then again, she'd known. They had talked about this exact problem and she had given him a promise – _a promise_ – that he had nothing to be afraid of. That promise had been one of the reasons he had allowed himself to get closer to her than he had ever been with any other girl before.

He drew a shaking breath when the memories of the day she had given him that promise came to him unbidden. It had been the tenth day of their relationship.

(Flashback - day ten)

Joey came home expecting an empty apartment. After ten days of making as much time for each other as they possibly could, they tried to go back to a bit of normalcy, which also involved taking their respective jobs a bit more seriously again. In Rachel's case this meant she had to work late hours to catch up with all the stuff she had neglected lately.

He stepped into the apartment, threw his key on the kitchen counter and leafed through the stack of mail that had been in their mailbox, sorting between his and Rachel's mail. His attention was drawn away from the letters pretty quickly, though, when the lounger turned and revealed a very naked Rachel, only covered by a flimsy silk scarf.

Then she got up slowly, left the scarf on the lounger and slunk over to him.

"You know, I thought that naked Thursdays thing wasn't such a bad idea after all," she purred while running a finger down his chest.

"I'm glad you finally agree," he grinned.

"Then why are you not naked?"

"Just give me a sec," he threw over his shoulder while running for the bathroom.

After taking a quick shower, he found her sitting on the lounger again.

Grinning, he walked over to her and asked, "So, now that I'm naked, what are you planning on doing with me?"

She stood up, turned him around and made him sit down on the lounger. Then she leaned down and kissed him before she said, "I actually have an idea."

He waited for her to make her move, but then she seemed to hesitate.

"What is it, Rach?"

"Will you… uh… let me try something?"

"Of course. What do I have to do?"

"Just… don't move… only if I tell you to."

He was mightily intrigued. Not just because she wanted to take the lead, but because she seemed so insecure about it. He had a vague sense that it might have something to do with the number of women he had been with before. He felt that she was afraid he would compare her to them or something. And although of course, he prided himself on having done everything at least once, his sex life had mostly consisted of fairly basic one-night stands. That wasn't even close to what he had with her.

She started kissing him, caressing him, and his whole line of thinking dissolved into a thick fog of desire.

Turned out what she had planned consisted out of going down on him until he was on the brink of exploding. Then she pulled back, having him groan with frustration. But she made up for that by slowly impaling herself on him. The way she was positioned over him, with him sitting upright and her breasts pressed against his chest, she felt even tighter than usual. Which made it even harder for him to hold back. But when he started to move, to thrust up inside her to increase the sensations, she reminded him that he was supposed to keep still.

He did as being told, still slightly shaking with the desire to just forget about what she wanted, and she started to clench her inner muscles around him. It took all his control and willpower at this point, but he kept perfectly still, wondering if it was possible topass out from excessive arousal. She contracted her muscles again... and again, until he found the release that had been building up inside him for what seemed like forever. He came with a long howling cry and blindly thrust upwards, not even remembering anymore what she had said. Every contraction of her inner walls drew another spasm out of him, another thrust, until he sagged back against the lounger, feeling drained and utterly satisfied.

He leaned his head back with closed eyes and waited until the world stopped spinning. When he opened his eyes again, she had pulled away from him and disposed of the used condom. Then she snuggled into his arms, looking at him intently.

"Thank you," he murmured under still labored breath, looking at her lovingly.

"You don't need to thank me, honey. I never did. It was about time that we made it about you for once."

Her sultry tone had him making a mental note that the next round was going to be about her.

"It was incredible, really. I think I saw stars."

"I think that was the title of the article where I read about it," she smiled.

It felt overwhelmingly good to know that he was the first guy she'd done that with. Only when he realized why that was, his stomach clenched painfully.

"So you didn't do that with… him?"

The soft expression on her face changed to trepidation in a matter of seconds.

"No, Joey. Don't…" Shaking her head she drew a shuddering breath and tried a different approach. "I read it in 'Cosmo' a few days ago and thought I should give it a try."

Trying to chase away the bad vibe he had brought on by his question, he smiled and said, "Remind me never to interrupt you again while reading that magazine."

"Worked out just fine the last time, didn't it?" she gave back lightly, but he saw the uneasiness still lingering in her eyes.

"Yeah, it did."

The memory made both of them smile genuinely, before Rachel seemed to have mustered the courage to finally address the elephant in the room. "Do you want to talk about that, Joey? About… you know… him?"

He sighed and rested his head back against the lounger, looking at the ceiling.

"I don't want to, but I don't think we can dodge that issue forever."

She moved around on his lap, drawing her knees to her chest. He knew she always did that when she felt vulnerable.

"Joey, I know he's your friend and you feel guilty about doing this to him, but Ross and I… we're over."

He shook his head and looked at her steadily.

"I don't think you are. I talked to him the other day. I didn't mention anything about us, but I asked him what he feels about you and he said he's still hoping that you two will get back together eventually."

"He really thinks that?" she asked with wide eyes.

"He still loves you, Rach."

Now she was the one shaking her head determinedly.

"I don't think he does. Ross… he is a bit like a dinosaur, he can't cope with changes. I mean… even two years after his divorce, even knowing Carol was gay, he still tried to get her back somehow, to make things the way they were. I'm like some backup plan for him. Every time one of his relationships fails, he tells himself, 'Oh that's all right, I love Rachel, I'm gonna be back together with her someday anyway.' I mean, yeah… he probably is gonna be mad at you for taking that chance away, but you didn't. Because that chance ceased to exist when he got married to Emily."

That was a connection he hadn't even seen before.

"That was the moment you stopped loving him?"

She contemplated that for a while until she said, "Yeah. Because… you know… I didn't stop loving him for a very… very long time. Ever since Ross and I broke up, I've never said 'I love you' to any other guy. But he loved Emily, he wanted to get married to her, only one year after we broke up. That made me leave my love for him in the past and unlike him, I'm never gonna turn back."

It felt good, reassuring, to know she felt that way, but he knew there was more to his fears than him thinking she might be still in love with Ross.

"Still… I feel guilty, and knowing he wants to get back with you… scares me."

"Why?"

He'd never had been one to hide his feelings, but admitting to this insecurity, to the true reason for his misgivings, was harder than he'd thought it would be.

"Rach, I… can't compete with what you two had going on for years. I'm afraid of losing you to him."

There it was. She responded to that with putting both her hands on his face, looking at him determinedly and seriously.

"Joey, this isn't a competition. Regardless of where Ross still is, I'm not there anymore. You're not gonna lose me to him."

He felt himself believing her. Not just because of the words she'd said, but because he could feel and see that it was the truth.

When he hadn't said something for a while, she pulled her hands away from his face and took his into hers, squeezing them firmly.

"Remember what you promised me that first night?"

"Of course I do," he answered, not quite knowing what she was getting at.

Her gaze holding his steadily, she told him, "That promise is binding for me as well."

(End flashback)

He had believed her. And it had been believable. With a sudden clarity he realized that the thought that she had broken her promise didn't hurt as much as the question why. The question what she might have been missing, what it was he couldn't give her, what he had done wrong. And he found that Monica had been right, there was no other way to find that out than to talk to her about it.

He pushed himself off Monica's couch and slowly made his way out of the apartment and over to his own. He hesitated a while when he stood in front of the door, heavily tempted to just turn around again. With shaking fingers he used his key to let himself in.

The second he stepped through the door, Rachel was at the door to her room. She looked like hell. He could see that she'd cried a lot, that she'd slept in her clothes, or hadn't even slept at all. A fresh bout of pain made his chest constrict and he had to force himself to breathe. Unable and unwilling to take a step into her direction, he just closed the door behind him and leaned his back against it, fixing Rachel with what he hoped was an angry glare.

There they were. Thirty six hours after the last time he'd told her he loved her, he couldn't even bring himself to say 'hi' anymore. It was glaringly obvious that Monica and Chandler were right, there was no way he could keep living with her after what happened.

Rachel took a few tentative steps towards him until she was standing about a step away.

"Joey," she began with a shaking voice, clearly not knowing what to say. "Are you okay?" When he just kept glaring at her, she hurriedly corrected herself. "I mean… I know you're not, how could you be? It's just, Monica said you were… you had…"

"I'll live." He could see how the coldness of his voice made her flinch, but he couldn't help it. It seemed like the only defense he had.

"Joe, I wanted to tell you how terribly sorry I am for what I've done. I wasn't thinking clearly, it just happened and…"

He couldn't believe she was trying to make this into something it wasn't. Into some misstep, some drunken mistake he could just forgive.

"You didn't just sleep with some guy, you slept with Ross."

"Does that make a difference?"

Again he couldn't believe what she was saying. "Of course it does! Do you even realize that this is every fear I ever had about us? That I would never stand a chance against what you two had? That one day, when he feels like it, he would come swooping in, claiming you back?"

Obviously she remembered all the conversations they had about the subject, recalled that her past relationship with Ross was his one sore spot, his one insecurity. He could see her searching for the best way to alleviate his fears, now that she had made them come alive.

"But he didn't get me back, Joey. We're over. We both know that now."

"And you needed to sleep with him to find that out?"

As soon as these words had left his mouth she started to cry and for some reason that made the pain he felt even worse. For a while he was hoping that seeing her suffer would lessen the pain, would feel like justice somehow, but he wasn't looking for revenge, he was looking for an explanation. Something, anything that would make him understand why she had done this to him, to them.

"I never wanted to hurt you, Joey. You have to believe me. I was just so overwhelmed and confused. I know now what I want. I want you, I love you."

He wished it could be this simple. But now he didn't trust her anymore. For years he had tried to figure out what women were talking about when the trust issue came up. He had always thought that there was some elusive moment in a relationship when two people decided that they now trusted each other and that they would never sleep with anyone else again. Now he knew what that really was about. It was about being sure that the one you love is the one person in the world that would never, ever hurt you. It was the thing Rachel made him promise, because she had already experienced a betrayal like this, which made what she did even more inexcusable.

"What happens the next time you're confused, Rachel? Are you gonna run and sleep with Ross then as well? The night before we get married? The day we talk about having a second child? The day we thinking about buying a house, or... or getting a dog?"

She stared at him wide eyed for a few moments and he realized that he might have let his guard down way too much with what he just said, with telling her how much he had wanted for them, how far into the future his dreams had already reached.

Her voice was a broken whisper that started to gain conviction and intensity with every word she said.

"That is so unfair, Joey, you know that. It will never happen again. What do I have to do to prove that to you?"

He actually had to think about that for a moment. But sadly enough, there wasn't one thing he could think of that would've given him back his faith in her. "You don't have to do anything. There was one thing you shouldn't have done."

The indisputable truth of this statement seemed to have taken Rachel's last remaining strength. She pressed her hand over her mouth and squeezed her eyes shut, shaking with suppressed sobs. Just when he thought he couldn't take it anymore, she closed the space between them and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"Look, Joey, I know I made a horrible… horrible mistake. I can't believe I did this, knowing myself how much it hurts. And I am so, so sorry. But I love you and I want to raise our child with you."

His body answered to her nearness on an instinctual level and he almost had his arms around her already, when he remembered whose arms she had been in the night before. He put his hands on her shoulders and shoved her away.

"Rachel, can't you understand exactly what I'm feeling right now? I wanted to raise her with you too, I would've loved to. I was really happy about having a baby with you. And I promise, I will be there for you and her as much as possible. But I don't think I'll ever be able to forget what you did to me. To say it with your words, Rachel: this changes everything."

Rachel was openly crying now and he knew he had to get out of there as soon as possible before he started to cry himself.

"You promised you would never hurt me, Joey. This… this hurts so much."

"I expected one thing of you, Rachel. That you'd keep the same promise I made. You broke it first."

She looked into his eyes and maybe she saw there how pointless it was to hope he would just forget and forgive instantaneously, because she suddenly asked, "How long can I stay here?"

He still wasn't sure about making her leave his apartment, his life. But he knew on the other hand that they couldn't live together anymore. It would hurt both of them far too much to be good for anything.

"Rachel, I don't mean to punish you. I'm not gonna make this hard on you or anything. You can stay here as long as you need to find a new place. I'll help you move your stuff. I want to be involved in everything about the baby. But Rach, we…" the words he was about to say almost choked him. "We're over."

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tbc 

Please review.


	8. TOW Chandler is a good friend

A/N: Again, thanks to my reviewers. You guys make me want to write faster. :)

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**TOW Chandler is a good friend**

(Day 53 – seventh week of pregnancy)

Chandler looked sadly over at the dark figure standing on the balcony of his apartment. Joey had gone there when he came back from his talk with Rachel. He hadn't wanted to talk to him about it, just asked him to let him alone out there for a while.

It pained Chandler to see his friend like that. Joey always seemed like someone who could be unfazed by the ups and downs of a relationship. Someone who could just move on, find happiness elsewhere if something didn't work out for him. He wasn't the guy who mourned his losses for too long, he was always looking for the positive aspects of everything.

Chandler cursed himself for the slip of tongue that led directly to Rachel getting together with Ross. He had always felt as if everything was his fault. He was happy for them when they got together, but seeing them break up so painfully tortured him for weeks. Having to suffer through years of 'on again, off again' was truly one of the few things that could make him cry. But seeing Joey, his best friend, someone he had supported and protected for years, getting caught up in this big 'Ross and Rachel' mess, actually made him despise them both.

He wondered why all that had hit Joey so hard, so mercilessly. Of course he knew how much something like this could hurt, but it wasn't supposed to break a man. Maybe the reason was Joey himself. He didn't do denial. The stage of an emotional traumatic experience that cushions the blow, that makes you realize what has happened to you slowly, was nothing Joey went through, normally. He took everything at face value, he saw things as they were and let them affect him unfiltered. This was what enabled him to enjoy everything life had to offer to the fullest. Now it was the reason he was dying inside.

Joey climbed back through the window and slowly made his way to the couch, smiling bravely.

"Wanna talk?" Chandler asked tentatively. He had no idea how to be around Joey anymore. He seemed so fragile, so broken. A few hours ago a stupid commercial had brought tears to Joey's eyes.

"I don't know, Chan. It seems it's all I do lately. Talk. I don't wanna talk, I want things to be back to how they were before everything went to hell. I want my life back."

It was still disconcerting to Chandler to realize how much Joey had matured over the past two days, how he had completely lost his boyish carelessness.

"What did Rachel say?"

"She wasn't meaning to hurt me, she is sorry, she wants to be with me, raise our child with me. She cried a lot and she actually made me feel bad for her."

"You don't have to feel bad for her."

"I can't help it. I see her cry and all I want to do is take her in my arms again and make it better. But how do you embrace something that burns you?"

Chandler had no answer to that.

………

A knock on the door startled Chandler out of his thoughts. Joey had gone to his room about half an hour ago and Chandler was still waiting for Monica who had gone looking for Ross, wanting to talk to him. Chandler didn't think it was a good idea. The last days had been emotionally taxing for both of them. Ross certainly wasn't the one with the biggest problems of the group. He opened the door and out there was Ross… sans Monica.

"Ross, what are you doing here? Monica is looking for you everywhere."

"I slept at work last night. Couldn't bring myself to go to my apartment."

Chandler was motioning for Ross to come in. Not so much out of courtesy, but out of the need not to make a scene in the hall.

When the door closed behind Ross, Chandler blew up.

"Am I supposed to feel sorry for you now, Ross? Because let me tell you, I'm not. I'm mad at you. For being a lousy friend, for not listening to us, for being unbelievably selfish. You're hurting? Good. Couldn't be bad enough. And you know why? Because it could never be as bad as Joey is hurting right now, or Rachel for that matter. It could never be as bad as it hurts a child that has to grow up between parents who don't love each other anymore. And let me tell you, I know a thing or two about that pain."

"Look Chandler… I know you're all thinking I did this to destroy their relationship or to win her back. But she came to me, she was standing at my door, and she kissed me first."

"And? What are you now, Ross? Someone who can't hold his own against a woman? You could have… you should have said no. Did you even realize how out of it she was? You should have sent her home to the man whose baby she's carrying. Why didn't you? I told you… no, I begged you to stay away from her, I had a feeling you would manage to mess it up for them."

"Chandler, I know you're upset, but I came here to talk to Joey."

Chandler suddenly knew how it feels to see red. "You can't talk to Joey! He is done talking. With anyone. He needs to be left alone to heal. He doesn't need a traitorous ex-best-friend to barge in and hurt him even more. Get out of here, Ross."

"Let's hear what he has to say."

Both men turned to the quiet voice that came from behind them. Joey was leaning against the doorframe, looking tired and pensive, but somehow stronger than before.

"You sure, Joey?" Chandler asked concerned, "You don't have to do this."

"I have to, Chan. Can you give us a minute? It won't be long."

"Okay, buddy. I'll go."

"Thank you, Chandler."

Chandler took a last worried look at both of his best friends and reluctantly went into his bedroom.

………

As the door had closed behind Chandler, Ross took a step into Joey's direction, who lifted his chin defiantly in a desperate attempt to appear stronger than he felt. The last thing he wanted was for Ross to see him cry.

Ross apparently interpreted his expression as hostility and asked, "Do you want to hit me, Joey?"

"What good would that do?" Joey replied weakly.

"Maybe it would make you feel better," Ross offered.

Feeling rage seething inside of him brought Joey's strength back in a rush. The thought that Ross had the impression it could be that simple, that he was this much of a caveman to be appeased by getting back at him with brutality made him despise Ross even more.

"Nothing, nothing's ever gonna make me feel better about this, don't you understand that, _Dr. Geller_?" he said with as much condescension in his voice as he could muster.

"I understand that, Joey, and you have no idea how sorry I am," Ross said and hang his head, obviously still thinking that would make him forgive him.

"It doesn't matter that you're sorry, or that Rachel's sorry. You two should've thought of that before."

"Joey, don't you understand that we have managed to leave our past behind us now? That she is now free to live her life with you and your child? That I'm never gonna stand in the way again, that I am happy for you?"

Joey felt himself starting to shake with rage. This was not good. If Ross kept saying things like that, he would get dangerously close to making good use of his offer from before.

"Why does this always have to be about you?" he said, trying his best to keep the trembling out of his voice, trying not to yell. "About the big 'Ross and Rachel' thing? That's over. It was over for years. This isn't about you or your past relationship with Rachel. It's about me and my relationship with Rachel. This is about the future of my child. You destroyed all that. You ripped my life apart, and I don't give a shit if you're sorry about that because I'm the one who has to live with the mess forever."

His outburst left him on the verge of tears. It was the same thing with hurting Ross like it was with hurting Rachel, it didn't help with his own pain at all.

"Joey, I know you're hurting. But you said yourself back when Rachel broke up with me that you couldn't understand why she wasn't giving me another chance. You can do that now. Give her another chance. She deserves it, your baby deserves it."

Joey shook his head dejectedly. Ross still failed to see the point. Even after more than four years, he still hadn't understood why Rachel really broke up with him.

"I can understand now why she didn't want to give you another chance. She was right. There are lines you can't cross. There are promises you can't break."

He hoped it would be over now, that Ross would finally turn around and go. He felt like his last ounce of strength had drained from him but he still wanted to appear as if he could handle the situation.

But Ross didn't give the impression he wanted to leave. He shuffled his feet while looking down on them, cleared his throat a few times and eventually started to speak again. "Joey, if you won't let her stay with you… she called me today, asking if I would let her stay at my place for a while… and I said yes… she's gonna move in with me."

A feeling of defeat came over him and he had to close his eyes for a moment. So this was how it was gonna be. This was what would happen. He battled down the desperation enough to be able to open his eyes again and glare at the man who used to be one of his best friends.

"Great, this day gets even better now. You just let her move in with you, raise my daughter, and have the family you always wanted. Be 'Ross and Rachel'. Who cares about stupid Joey? He wasn't father material anyway. I hope you'll be happy with the life you've stolen from me."

* * *

tbc 


	9. TOW the Ultrasound

* * *

**TOW the Ultrasound**

(Week 12 of pregnancy)

Rachel had moved out of Joey's apartment without his help. Not that he wouldn't have helped, but she hadn't asked. Ross had told her what Joey's reaction had been to hearing she would move in with him, and she couldn't blame him. She tried to picture her reaction if Ross had informed her that Chloe was moving in with him. There was no way she would've thought that it might be only two friends living together. But as it was, it seemed to be her only option. Phoebe had just one bedroom, she couldn't live with Monica because Chandler hated her now, and she didn't have the strength to look for and decorate a new apartment.

For a while she had contemplated just staying at Joey's, but that wasn't a good idea at all. It would be like taking advantage of a generous offer. Besides, staying in the apartment without him was like an especially cruel kind of emotional torture. So four days after they had ended their relationship, she had packed all her things and moved in with Ross. She told Monica over the phone that Joey could now go back to his apartment.

She hadn't seen Joey since the day he told her it was over, and she was grateful for that. The day after the breakup she went to her doctor and had the pregnancy confirmed. The doctor even showed her the baby on the ultrasound, nothing more than a bundle of tissue with a beating heart. Everything seemed to be okay and the doctor had told her to come back four weeks later.

"At the twelfth week the baby is already going to look like a human being. You might want to bring the father."

Three hours after that she had eventually managed to stop crying. She had no idea how to approach him about that. Of course he had said he wanted to be involved and she believed him, but going to him, talking to him, knowing he hated her for what she had done… it seemed like an impossible task.

Her first opportunity to say something came a week after she had moved out. She was at the coffeehouse with Phoebe and Monica, looking through the brochures she had gotten from her doctor and the pregnancy books Phoebe had brought.

"Rach, if you have any questions about pregnancy and giving birth, you can ask me. If you wanna know stuff about taking care of a baby, well, I guess in that case you have to read the books."

"Thanks Pheebs," she had smiled warily. Sometimes she had the impression her friends were happier about her being pregnant than she was. Some of the brochures fluttered to the ground and she dove after them. When she came back up, everyone was suddenly silent.

"Wha… " she started to ask when she saw the reason of the awkward silence standing at the little table, gaping at her.

She wanted to say something, at least a 'Hi' would've been an accomplishment in the situation, but her throat just closed in on itself. Her heart made a painful lurch and her stomach clenched, letting her fear she might be sick. The stupid thing was, if they were giving each other the silent treatment, one of them should just have left, but neither of them seemed capable of doing so. In some totally screwed up way it felt so good to see him again, to know he hadn't completely vanished out of her life.

Phoebe finally defused the awkward situation. "Guys, as fascinating as it is to see you staring at each other, it gets old very fast. So Joey, sit down, and Rachel… you too."

Joey slowly sat down on one of the chairs and Rachel settled back on the couch. Once she had broken eye contact with him, she couldn't bring herself to look up at him again although she could still feel his gaze drilling into her. She took all the books and brochures and stuffed them back into the bag and stood up.

"I've got to go, see you, guys," she mumbled before running out of the coffeehouse.

Phoebe caught up with her two blocks later. "Rachel, do you even know where you want to go? Because this street leads neither to your apartment nor to anywhere… actually. So what is it?"

"Pheebs, you know what it is."

"So you can't even stand to be in one room with him anymore? How is that gonna work out with the whole being parents thing?"

"God, I wish I knew."

"You didn't even tell him about the ultrasound."

"Pheebs, I couldn't even manage to say 'hi', so 'ultrasound' comes, like, ten steps after that."

"But why?"

"When I saw him, all I could think of was that I wanted to crawl into his arms and forget everything that happened. Knowing he doesn't want me to… knowing he… hates me now… Pheebs, I'm sorta glad I managed to breathe, that hurts so much."

"Don't you think he's hurting too?"

"I know he's hurting. That doesn't make it easier."

"Do you think it makes it easier for him, seeing you unable to even communicate with him anymore?"

"No… no, I don't think so."

"So if you feel guilty for hurting him… and I think you should… you are the one who has to make an effort, who has to try not to make him feel worse than he already does. Do you understand that?"

"Yes… yes I do."

"So stop feeling sorry for yourself and start to think about him and – first and foremost – about your baby."

Thinking about that, now, three weeks later, she was still amazed at how pitiless and demanding Phoebe had been. How honest. It had hurt her at first, it had made her think she had lost another friend, because she knew how much Phoebe cared about Joey, but it made her pull herself together. It had been a kick in the ass she obviously needed. She had to stop feeling like the victim here. Because she wasn't.

The next time she had met Joey at the coffeehouse, she had managed a somewhat civilized greeting and they had made it through almost five minutes before Joey gave in to the urge to leave, prompting Phoebe to run after him too. Rachel didn't know what she had said to him, but the third time they met, he asked her how she was feeling, even if it took him at least three attempts to get it out.

It took her four to form a coherent sentence as an answer. Knowing that her time was running out, that she had only ten days left to tell him about the appointment with her doctor, didn't make things easier. Obviously tired of all her trudging around the subject, Monica and Phoebe just stood up and left the coffeehouse with some laughable excuse.

It had been now or never.

She had twisted her hands together in her lap and found it somewhat easier to speak to them instead of speaking to him. "So… uh… Joe, I wanted to tell you that… I have an appointment with my doctor in ten days and I… uh… wanted to ask you if you… might want to come. She says she's gonna make an ultrasound and we could… see the baby… you know. But if you don't want…"

"I'll be there," he answered quickly and she looked up at him, surprised. Her gaze seemed to make him feel insecure and now he was the one taking great interest in his own hands.

"I mean… uhm… if you want me to."

A tiny smile stole onto her lips at that. "Of course I want you to. I wouldn't have asked if I didn't."

He looked up again at her words and this time it felt as if they were really looking at each other again, but she couldn't stand the pain and devastation in his eyes for long, so she cast her eyes downwards again. After rummaging through her purse, she put a yellow post-it on the table.

"This is the address and phone number of my doctor and the date and time of the appointment. See you there, Joey." She had left without looking back at him, feeling not as relieved as she had thought she would be.

And now the day had come, she laid all prepped and legs apart on the examination table and Joey – was late. The moment she thought he had decided not to come at all, he barged into the room, panting heavily.

"I'm sorry I'm late. Did I miss anything?"

"No, just me getting naked from the waist down and…" at that moment it occurred to her that she was indeed naked from the waist down, shielded from his eyes only by a thin blanket thrown haphazardly over her knees. Their eyes met and there was no denying that this situation wasn't just awkward, it was ridiculous.

She bit her bottom lip to keep herself from grinning, but when she saw the corner of his mouth twitch, she couldn't help but grin.

"Not that this is a completely unfamiliar situation," she joked and he had to chuckle at that. She was glad they had broken the ice at least a bit.

"So how is living at Ross's going?" Joey asked, taking her by surprise.

Encouraged by the seemingly light mood she answered, "I liked it better with my last roommate."

As soon as these words had left her mouth, she flinched at the fact that this sentence had so much more meaning than she had intended it to. And Joey didn't seem to be in the mood to let that slide.

"Well, wouldn't he be glad to hear that."

"Joey, I …" she started but was interrupted by the doctor coming into the room.

"Hello, Miss Green, nice to see you again," she greeted Rachel cheerfully and sat down at the examination table. "And you are?" she prompted Joey who still lingered near the door, obviously not knowing where his place in all of this was.

"I.. uhm… I'm Joey Tribbiani. The… the father."

Rachel bit her lip at Joey's stammered words. The father. Not the boyfriend, the friend or anything. No. The father. It wasn't even clear to her why that hurt her so much. She knew he hadn't come here because of her, but because of his child. Still, having that so obviously made clear hurt more than she would've thought.

Oblivious to the drama unfolding in front of her, the doctor leafed through Rachel's file.

"Everything is great, your blood test is okay, count of rubella antibodies is okay… well, seems like a by-the-book pregnancy to me," she finished, looking up to Rachel with a friendly smile.

Rachel forced herself to smile back.

"Okay, let's take a look at the little one, shall we?" the doctor went on, and she started to prepare the intra-vaginal ultrasound probe while Rachel tried her best to stop herself from grimacing. She had hoped this time they could make the ultrasound from outside. Even though she willed herself to relax, when the cool surface of the probe touched her, she flinched back.

The doctor smiled up to her. "Relax, Rachel."

And she did. But it wasn't because of what the doctor had said, but because she suddenly felt a comforting presence behind her and a warm, strong hand was placed on her shoulder. She stopped herself from putting her own hand over his, though, like she wanted to. That certainly would've been too much.

Then suddenly, nothing mattered anymore, because a strange sound filled the room, fast, like a pulse racing in one's ears after running. Maybe even faster. And on the monitor she could see it, her child. She didn't even need the doctor to explain what she saw to her, like the first time she had been here. Everything was clearly visible. A complete human being, lying peacefully in her womb, created during one of many nights of passionate lovemaking with the man who stood right behind her. It was a miracle. Their little miracle.

On her peripheral field of awareness she noticed the doctor removing the dreadful probe and smiling at her.

"I'll give you two a minute."

They barely noticed her walking out of the room.

What she did notice was Joey removing his hand from her shoulder, grasping her hand instead while stepping closer to the monitor, which he seemed unable to wrench his eyes off. Just as she was.

"God, that is so amazing," she heard Joey whisper after a while. "It's so strange to think that there is someone in there. A baby…"

It was then she became aware that their hands were tightly clasped together. She hadn't even thought about it before, it had felt so right, so natural.

"Our baby, Joey," she said quietly, while looking down at their intertwined hands.

When she looked up again, she saw that he had turned his head to her. His eyes were brimming with tears and his face was lit up by a profound happiness, the same she felt while looking at the monitor. And she saw something else in his eyes, or better, the lack of something. It was like something had given way inside him, like some impenetrable wall had crumbled, broken down by the tiny person on the screen.

"Yeah, our baby," he whispered while holding her gaze.

"So, do you have any questions?" the doctor's friendly voice invaded their moment, bringing them back to reality.

Joey let go of her hands at once and the loss of contact felt almost physically painful.

"I have," Joey said to her surprise.

"Okay, so why don't you come with me while Ms. Green gets dressed?"

He nodded and after looking at her briefly, he followed the doctor out of the room.

Rachel sighed and after a last look at the monitor before her, climbed off the examination table.

………

"So, Mr. Tribbiani, what is it you want to know?"

Joey cleared his throat uncomfortably and suddenly found the question he wanted to ask rather childish and immature. But since he was already here…

"Is there… anything I can do… to help her, you know?"

The doctor inclined her head a little to the side, her steady, though not unfriendly gaze unsettling him even more.

"I take it you're not in a relationship?" she asked instead of answering his question right away.

He asked himself what might have given it away and shook his head. "No. But I want to be a part of…" he waved his hand, frantically searching for the right word. "…this," he finally said, wondering when the last time had been that he had felt like such an idiot.

"That's good to hear," the doctor said with an approving nod, making him feel a bit more at ease again. "But right now, there's not much you can do. Just… be there for her. Give her the feeling that you're there no matter what. That she can count on you."

………

He was still puzzling over the doctor's words while he said goodbye and left her office, waiting for Rachel who had gone in after him, probably asking a few questions herself. He also waited for her while she got a new appointment, then he helped her into her coat and held the door open for her when they left.

The awkwardness only came back when they stood on the street, unsure what to do next.

"So… wanna take a cab together?" Rachel finally asked.

"No, I… have to go back to the studio," he answered, not quite able to keep a hint of regret out of his voice.

"Oh… okay," Rachel said hastily. "Then… bye."

She turned quickly and started to go, as if she suddenly needed to be far away from him.

"Rachel… wait."

Looking at him expectantly, she slowly turned around again.

"I…" he started, stuffing his hands into his coat pockets to keep himself from fidgeting nervously, "I want you to know that… I meant what I said about wanting to be involved. If there's anything I can do… just tell me."

She favored him with a light smile.

"Okay," she breathed. Then she cleared her throat and a little louder she said, "And… thanks for being here… today. It meant… it meant a lot to me."

His heart lurched painfully in his chest and he wasn't quite sure if he could trust his own voice when he said, "Any time, Rach."

* * *

tbc 


	10. TOW Joey can't help

**TOW Joey can't help **

(Week 16 of pregnancy)

Rachel felt restless, she had caught herself taking deep breaths, squirming in her seat and starting to daydream. Something was wrong with her and she had yet to figure out what.

"So, you think it's gonna be a girl or a boy?"

Phoebe's question pulled her out of her thoughts. Luckily for her, she had heard it. Not like today in her meeting when she had zoned out so completely, she had had no idea what everyone had been talking about.

"Joey thinks it's a girl. He kept talking about 'her' from the second he knew I was pregnant."

"And you?"

The question surprised her a bit. Ever since Joey had said 'she' the first time, she had never once questioned the fact that she was going to have a girl.

"I don't know. I guess I think he's right. It doesn't matter as long as it's healthy. Right now I have… other problems."

"What's up? I mean… besides the obvious."

"I'm feeling so strange, you know. Antsy and on edge somehow."

"Wait, aren't you in your fourth month of pregnancy?"

"Yeah, why?"

"This is completely normal, around the fourth month your hormones start going crazy."

She couldn't believe that it had never occurred to her to ask Phoebe about that. The only friend she had who had already been pregnant. And since she was mentioning hormones, maybe she could admit to her why she was feeling on edge, what her daydreams were about.

"God yeah, I guess this is what I'm feeling. I can barely think of anything else but sex at the moment. So this happened to you?"

"Oh absolutely yeah! Oh and keep in mind, now, I was carrying triplets so in, y'know, medical terms I was… I was thrice as randy."

"Well, you know what? When I go see my doctor tomorrow I'll ask her about this. Maybe she can give me a pill or something."

"Yeah. Yeah, that's what you need a good... pill."

She winced at that. Of course, there was a seemingly easier way to solve that particular problem, but Phoebe should've known that for her that was completely out of reach.

"Phoebe! I'd love to solve that problem with something other than a pill, but it's not gonna happen, so stop making fun of me."

"What about… you know… the father. I mean, he wanted to be involved so…"

'Yeah,' she thought bitterly to herself, 'as if being involved means sleeping with the woman who hurt him to make _her_ feel better.' She tried her hardest not to even think about the possibility, not to get her hopes up.

"The 'father' got his heart broken by me and can barely stand to talk to me, let alone help me with this particular problem, so I guess it's gonna be the pill," she said in a tone that was meant to be eloquent, but sounded more like a question.

"Rachel, it's been three months. Have you even tried to talk to him about that? Joey was never someone to hold a grudge for all eternity and he knows that you're sorry. Just talk to him, he might be okay with it."

Hope rushed through her like a burst of adrenalin. Her heart started to hammer against her ribs and she had to take a few shuddering breaths to calm herself down.

"God, Pheebs. You have no idea what just thinking about it does to me."

"That good, huh?" Phoebe said with a suggestive leer.

She smiled dreamily at that question, out of ideas what to say to that, how to describe what he could make her feel.

"Didn't Joey kiss you once?"

"More than once."

Well, not that it was any of her business anymore, but for a split moment, jealousy reared its ugly head. But she squashed the silly thought and concentrated on what she wanted her friend to understand.

"And?"

"It was pretty good… well, it was definitely above average. More in the really great category, actually."

She smiled in a superior way and started to get up. Now that Phoebe had put that idea into her head, there was no way that she wouldn't at least try to refresh her memory of how great he really was.

"Well then, multiply that with infinity and you'll get an idea of what I am talking about. If you'll excuse me, I'll have to go talk to the father of my child."

………

Joey was surprised to hear the soft knock on his door. Chandler usually never knocked and when Monica knocked, he was always afraid she would smash the door in.

He was even more surprised to see Rachel standing outside. Her cheeks were red and she panted as if she had run up the stairs. Maybe he should tell her to stop doing this in her condition.

"Hi Joey, can I come in?" she asked insecurely.

Something was up, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

"Sure," he said with a polite nod, waiting for her to step into the apartment before he closed the door again.

When he turned around and saw her standing there, looking around herself; when he saw her gently touching the leather of the Barcalounger as if deep in thought, he realized that they hadn't been together in this apartment since the day of the breakup.

He had to lean against the kitchen counter for a moment when it hit him how much he missed her. For a moment he tried to imagine just having her here again, pretending that nothing had happened, forgetting about it. He knew he still loved her, maybe…

"What were you doing?"

He had been so busy staring at her, her question caught him completely off guard. After gesturing in the direction of the little table where an open book was lying, he eventually managed, "Reading."

Rachel didn't even look in the direction he had indicated. "Learning lines for DOOL?"

"No, 'Baby's first year'."

For some reason, that seemed to honestly surprise her. "You're reading baby books? I thought you knew about babies from your sisters?"

"I thought it couldn't hurt to check if they were right about stuff."

She turned around and lifted the book up he had been reading, leafed through it for a while and then sighed dejectedly. "I have to rely totally on the books, I don't know the first thing about babies. I'm gonna be a terrible mother."

There was so much concern in her eyes, so much sadness, he couldn't stand the thought that she was torturing herself with that notion.

"You're gonna be a great mom, you'll see," he said, trying to sound as honest and convincing as he could muster. She had to see that he meant it, that she didn't need to worry.

She took a step into his direction and looked at him in a way that made him freeze on the spot.

"Joey …" she began and his chest constricted painfully at her soft and pleading tone of voice.

Mostly, the pain he felt was like dull ache, but hearing her say his name like that, having her look at him like that… he wasn't even close to being able to handle that.

"So, what brought you here?" he asked a bit more harshly than he had intended to.

Rachel blushed deeply and took a step back. He noticed that she took a few deep breaths and that the skin of her forehead was shimmering with sweat. She looked sick somehow.

"What is it, Rachel, you look like you have a fever or something."

After taking a few more deep breaths, after wringing her hands together and wiping them on her pants, she finally managed, "It is in a way a pregnancy related problem that I have."

He patiently waited for her to continue, but her condition got worse with the second.

"I… uhm… I have… I feel…" she stammered after a while only to continue with, "God, it is hot in here."

Her unusual behavior started to worry him. He frantically tried to match the symptoms she was showing to the things he had read in the books and suddenly a very disturbing similarity came to mind.

"Rachel, this doesn't have anything to do with the fourth month of pregnancy thing, has it? The hormones…?" he asked, hoping to hear a clear 'no' from her.

"How do you know about that?" she asked instead, almost relieved.

"Reading, Rach," he gave back, still hoping that that wasn't what this was about.

"Well I was thinking… that you maybe, could help me out with this."

At first he didn't even know what to say to this, it was totally outrageous.

"Rachel! What made you think I would agree to this? After what happened!"

Tears glistened in her eyes when she took another step in his direction, pleadingly looking at him. "I knew it was a long shot, Joey, but I had to take it. These hormones are driving me crazy. But it's not just that. I miss you, Joey. I miss you so much it hurts. I miss…you know… us."

He had to close his eyes for a second after hearing her say that. As if he didn't know how that felt. As if he didn't miss her so much that he had cried himself to sleep more times than he would care to admit.

"I miss you too, Rach. But…"

He tried to come up with something to say, anything that would fit after that 'but', anything that would explain to her – and to him – why they couldn't be together although they obviously needed each other that much, although they had their history… and their future.

"I'm not saying you should take me back," Rachel continued when he hadn't said anything for a while. "This doesn't have to mean anything if you don't want it to. I just need you to… kiss it better."

The slightest hint of a smile played around her lips and the allusion to their first night wasn't lost on him at all. But why for crying out loud did she think that it could ever not mean anything? Didn't she know that it would always mean everything to him? That it always had? Had she ever really understood how much she had meant to him? Maybe if not, then it would be more than a mistake to start things again.

"It's over, Rachel, you have to accept that."

Another step towards him and she stood right in front of him. She put her hands on his chest and looked up to him with a sad smile.

"How can I, knowing I'll never hold you in my arms again, or touch your skin, or feel your lips? Knowing I'll never make love to you? How can I accept that I can never kiss you again when it's all I can do not to kiss you right now?"

He smiled a bit. "You watch too much TV, Rach."

"I loved how Drake said that, I couldn't say it better because this is exactly what I'm feeling."

She moved closer to him, lightly moving into his body, tilting her head up, looking unflinchingly into his eyes.

"Tell me to stop, Joey," she murmured, inching closer to his face. "Just tell me… to stop."

The kiss she gave him was tender and loving, opening his heart, making him melt. When he opened his mouth to her, she deepened the kiss and passion flared up in both of them. The way the fire was back between them, as if there hadn't been three months of misery since the last time they had made love, surprised him. It made him momentarily forget all about heartaches and pain, about ex-boyfriends and babies and insincere friends. It was better than any kiss he'd gotten from her before, because it not only flooded his heart with the happiness he always felt when she kissed him, but it also took away the pain and he desperately needed to get rid of the pain.

He crushed her to him, plundering her pliable mouth with the eagerness of a drowning man gasping for air. He shoved her against the wall and somewhere in the back of his mind he registered that it was the same spot where everything had begun. Needing to feel more of her, he kissed his way down to the side of her neck, to the very sensitive patch of soft skin that always made her go crazy when he grazed it lightly with his teeth.

A long, deep moan from Rachel triggered something in his head. A picture of Ross, kissing the same spot on her neck that he himself kissed right now. Of Rachel, moaning like she did just seconds before. He tried to push it away, resumed kissing her passionately but another picture forced itself on him. Rachel kissing Ross.

He paused, swallowing hard. Trying to force down the sickness crawling up in him. Another picture, Rachel running her hands over Ross's naked chest. He swallowed again, sensing he might lose the fight against the urge to throw up. More pictures came, faster and faster, with an unrelenting speed.

Rachel sinfully naked, legs wrapped around Ross's body. Ross touching her, kissing her, making her come. He tore himself away from her and stumbled blindly into the bathroom. Behind the closed door he tried to get a grip but the pictures just kept coming. He doubled over and retched into the toilet until he was only dry heaving. Then he sat down on the floor, resting his back against the bathtub. He could barely muster the strength to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand.

It was the first time in his life he felt utterly defeated. It was the first time in his life he wanted to die.

In this moment Rachel appeared at the door, looking worried. "Sweetie, what's wrong? I heard you getting sick, what happened?"

He couldn't answer, he wasn't sure if she needed to know what kind of pathetic loser she had turned him into.

She was still glowing from what they did before. The realization made his stomach turn again and it took his last remaining strength to push a new wave of nausea back into his gut. She busied herself at the sink and kneeled down beside him, running a wet washcloth over his lips and then handing him a glass of water. He drank it greedily, needing to wash away the foul taste in his mouth.

"God, you're scaring me, Joey. What was that? Something you ate?" she asked, lightly caressing his face.

He lifted his gaze to her and just looked into her eyes. It was obvious when it hit her. He could tell by the way she suddenly drew her hand away, by the way all the color drained out of her cheeks and by the way the moisture shot into her eyes. She clamped a hand over her mouth and tried to backpedal as fast as she could, almost falling down in the process.

"I'm sorry, Rachel," he said tonelessly, "…but I can't help you."

* * *

tbc 

A/N: As always, your opinions are very appreciated and helpful.


	11. TOW the pineapple

**TOW the pineapple**

Rachel wondered why it had never bothered her that Monica's apartment was on the fourth floor. Because right now, it did. According to her OB-GYN her blood pressure was too low anyway, not to mention the other things that were wrong with her right now. So walking up all the stairs to Monica's was a bit of a challenge.

She still did it regularly, though, because Monica was about the only person she felt comfortable with. Chandler still hated her, so she always called Monica before she came over to make sure Chandler wasn't at home.

Also, lately she found herself avoiding the coffeehouse. Although she knew Phoebe was always trying to help, talking to her drained her strength somehow. Besides, there was always a chance of seeing Joey in the coffeehouse and for the past five weeks this was something she had tried to avoid as well.

Since the kissing incident five weeks ago, being around Joey was torture. For both of them. They barely managed to look at each other anymore. There was this mix of pain, embarrassment and humiliation that had taken days to overcome enough that she had been able to stand being in his presence for as long as it took to say 'Hi' and 'I've gotta go', and she was pretty sure he felt the same.

It wasn't even like she couldn't understand what had happened, the problem was that she understood it too well. She knew that it had nothing to do with forgiveness. It had to do with what he saw when he closed his eyes. Because then he saw her with Ross and that made him sick because it made him feel inferior and lacking. It made him experience the sickening fear of being hurt like that again. She knew this, because she had been there, too, once. Only that for Joey, it must have been a hundred times worse. Back with Ross, she hadn't even known the girl he had been sleeping with and she had the pictures in her head for months. Joey had to face the betrayal of two people he thought he could trust implicitly. She couldn't even imagine what that must feel like.

Facing Ross wasn't much easier. Sure, they somehow managed to live together and he was always trying his best to counter her constant depression with a fake good mood. But she knew he was suffering, too. And although she even asked him how he felt, he never gave her a real answer. It was like he didn't want to burden her with his misery on top of her own.

She knew it wasn't that his failure – this momentary lapse they both had fallen victim to – erased the failure she and Joey had made by breaking the rules like that, by springing the news on him the way they had, by letting things get so horribly out of hand.

When she had told Ross what had happened with Joey that day five weeks ago, he had asked cautiously if she didn't think that Joey was overly dramatic. That, in the face of the fact that Joey himself hadn't been exactly a saint before and that breaking hearts hadn't been foreign to him, his reaction seemed slightly self-righteous and hypocritical. She had nixed that. She'd told him that it hadn't been Joey who had done something wrong. That it had been her and that Joey's reactions were justified and understandable.

She could tell that Ross didn't agree with that, but thankfully he let it go.

So that left her with Monica. The one who steered clear of painful subjects, who was excited about her pregnancy and didn't make her feel bad for destroying the group and breaking both her brother's and her friend's hearts. The one who knew that she accused herself of that enough almost every hour of every day.

As she took the last step to the fourth floor, she saw Joey storming over thehallway to his apartment, slamming the door shut behind him. Slowly walking over to the door number nineteen, she wished she could just walk through it like she used to. Instead she put her hand on the smooth wooden surface for a while, thinking back to happier days.

Then she turned and opened the door to the other apartment.

Monica stood in the kitchen, wiping the kitchen counter. When she saw her, she smiled at her a bit strained.

"Hi, Rachel."

Sensing that something was amiss and that it probably had something to do with Joey storming out of the apartment, she asked, "I saw Joey coming out of here a moment ago. Everything all right?"

Monica pointed to a bowl that stood on the kitchen table and said, "I'd made him a bowl of pineapple pieces. I had brought it from the restaurant and thought he would like it, he always had before. He saw it, started to tear up and ran out. I have no idea what I did wrong."

Rachel looked at the bowl and tears sprang to her eyes too. She pressed her hand over her mouth to keep herself from sobbing loudly. Monica looked at her in alarm and guided her gently to the couch where she just sank down, unable to hold herself upright anymore.

Such a happy memory. And now it was forever tainted. Just like everything else.

(flashback to day 20)

Joey looked at the pineapple lovingly, trying to imagine it to be Rachel. He had planned to learn the lines for his new romantic storyline on DOOL with her, but she had had a headache when she got home from work and went to take a nap. So he was left with the pineapple and had to work real hard to be intense and passionate towards a piece of fruit.

"Why are we fighting this? You know, you want it to happen as much as I do. I want you. I need you. Let me make love to you."

Suddenly the fruit was ripped out of his hand by Rachel, who pretended to be angry and hissed at the pineapple. "Oh you bitch, keep your hands off my man!"

Joey chuckled amusedly.

"And you, mister, what did you think you were doing here?"

"Oh baby, I swear, she was forcing me into it. She is holding my twin brother in a dungeon."

"Is that the truth?" Rachel interrogated the fruit. "Oh we'll see about that."

Rachel took the pineapple into the kitchen, got a really big knife and cut the fruit into little pieces. After putting them into a bowl, she brought them back to Joey, climbed into his lap, fished one piece out of the bowl and put it into Joey's mouth.

"Please don't do that with the actress I have to say those lines to," he smiled when he was done eating.

"I wouldn't bet on it," Rachel said, feeding him another piece.

"That's too bad, I was planning on taking you with me to the set tomorrow, but…" he trailed off looking pointedly at the piece Rachel held in her fingers.

She grinned. "Oh, you wouldn't dare not take me, not after already telling me about it."

He sighed in dramatic defeat.

"There will be a party at the set tomorrow after we're done shooting, but I guess it doesn't matter anyway, since I still haven't learned my lines and they'll probably fire me before that party even starts."

"Why didn't you want to learn them with me?"

"I did, but since you wanted to take a nap, I didn't want to keep you from sleeping."

"If you had been as concerned about me getting enough sleep last night, I wouldn't have needed to take that nap."

"Last night I didn't get the impression you wanted to sleep", he said, leering.

She tried to bite back a smile but finally failed at it. "Okay, you're right. So, come on, give me that script, where were you?"

She put the bowl with the pineapple pieces on the floor and picked up the script that lay there.

"I want you. I need you. Let me make love to you."

Letting the script sink onto her lap, Rachel leaned in to kiss Joey. Just the moment before there lips met, Joey whispered, "Your line, Rachel."

"Uhm… right, the line."

Her eyes went wide when she saw the line her character was supposed to say.

"What! That stupid chick is turning you down?"

Joey sighed. "She is turning Drake down."

"It's still stupid."

"Rach, I appreciate the sentiment but…"

"Okay, I'm on it…" she hurried to say and cited from the script, "No, Drake. We can't do this. You know how much is at stake."

"What's at stake is your heart, your soul, your happiness. Do you think he's worth sacrificing all that for?"

"Drake, you don't know anything about my heart, and I don't really believe in the deepness of your feelings, of your passion."

"I love you so much, it feels like this passion burning inside me will kill me if I can't be with you. But I'm afraid words won't ever do justice to what I feel. Let me show you."

Her heart melted at the words, spoken with so much sincerity, with so much genuine feelings behind them.

"Yeah, please show me," she whispered, leaning in again.

Joey pulled back.

"Rachel!"

Realizing that she had broken out of character again, she tried to cover for her mistake. "Oh come on, Joe. This is what she should say. Any woman would say that."

"Aw, Rach," he sighed, his tone a mixture of irritation and regret, "you know I can't keep learning my lines if you say stuff like that."

"Stuff like what?" she murmured into his ear and then proceeded to kiss her way down his neck.

"Like…" his attempt at formulating a coherent sentence was cut short by a gasp when she playfully bit his neck while raking her fingernails through his hair.

"Like how I just can't keep my hands off you because you're too sexy for your own good?" she finished for him while his breathing became considerably faster. "Or stuff like how good it feels to have you touch me…"

She felt his hands wandering up her back, felt him loosening the makeshift knot in her hair and fanning it out.

"… everywhere."

It almost knocked the breath out of her when he kissed her, unrestrained and passionate. In the back of her mind she congratulated herself for changing his mind. The victory made her feel adventurous so she broke the kiss after a while and picked up the bowl with the fruit pieces again.

"We're not finished with this traitorous lady here."

She took a piece and put it between her lips. Immediately picking up on what she was up to, he brought his mouth to hers, taking a bite, making the juice running down her chin.

When her hands instinctively went to her chin to wipe the sticky fluid away, he took her hand and shook his head.

"Let me take care of this."

Giddy with anticipation she lifted her chin a bit, signaling him to do whatever he had in mind. The sensation of his lips and tongue on the sensitive skin of her throat made her moan with pleasure.

"Oh yeah Joey, don't stop."

To her bottomless dismay, he did.

"It's clean."

"You sure?" she asked, bringing another piece to her mouth, running it over her lips and down her chin and her throat, making sure there was a lot of skin for him to clean up. Without complaining he went back to work and just when she thought that now he wouldn't need any further encouragement, he stopped again.

"I'm afraid I'm not quite done yet but there are clothes in the way, so …"

She was just about to ask what was stopping him from taking them off, when she saw the challenge in his eyes.

'You've started this game, now keep playing it,' the look seemed to say.

And although she'd always thought of herself as someone who was seduced rather than seducing, the thought of calling the shots excited her to a surprising degree.

She put the bowl away and stood up, slowly taking off her t-shirt. His unwavering gaze made her feel a bit self-conscious at first, but the way he looked at her gave her back her confidence. When she started to pull her pants down slowly, making a bit of a show out of it, when she saw how much this turned him on, it aroused her more than she would've ever thought possible.

As she was standing before him completely naked, his eyes were black and he gripped the arms of the lounger so tight, his knuckles turned white. A triumphant smile spread over her face and a sudden feeling of power surged through her. She knew by now that by being the passive one he had given her power not only over what was happening, but over himself.

After taking his hand and pulling him into a standing position, she started to unbutton his shirt and then pushed it off his shoulders. She took a step back and just looked at him for a while, letting him see how much she enjoyed the view. Then she took his hand again and sat down on the floor, motioning for him to sit beside her.

"So, about that juice …" she said and took another slice, sliding it over her throat, down her chest and to her breasts. When she touched her nipple with the somewhat cold piece of fruit, she couldn't help but close her eyes for a second, moaning.

In that moment she felt his hand over hers, directing it to her other breast, circling the other nipple until her shaking hand couldn't hold the piece anymore and she sank onto the floor.

He didn't let her wait. He began his task with kissing and licking her throat again, following the sweet path the pineapple had left. When his mouth was finally on her breast, she arched her back, trying to intensify the contact. But again, after giving the same attention to her other breast, he just stopped right when she wanted nothing more than for him to just take over.

"Done," he stated, grinning mischievously.

Her eyes snapped open and, seeing him grin like that, she smiled back determinedly.

"You are so not done," she said, reaching for the bowl again. The sensation of cold fluid on her heated skin made her close her eyes again. This time, the piece wandered even further south, leaving a little pool of sweetness in her bellybutton and a sticky trail on the inside of her thighs. When she reached the place she so badly wanted him to touch, to kiss; self-consciousness made her stop again. Could she really do that? This was like touching herself right in front of his eyes. It felt more intimate than everything she'd ever done with someone. For a while she waited for his hand to guide her through that again, but it didn't happen. Instead she heard his voice, dark and rumbling, slightly shaking.

"I think I know now what burning passion is."

Opening her eyes she knew it too, because she saw the fire burning in his eyes, could feel it heating up her skin just from the way he looked at her. Her doubts left her for good and she let her hand travel the rest of the way. Fortunately, he didn't need more convincing and he was very thorough in taking care of the mess she'd made.

(end flashback)

Monica held Rachel and stroked her back for as long as it took her to get a grip again. Her reaction had freaked her out even more than Joey's had. Eventually Rachel pulled back and wiped her eyes, trying to smile at her.

"Monica… you didn't… do anything wrong. It's just… a memory we both share," she whispered.

"What memory?"

Rachel shook her head. It didn't seem like she didn't want to answer her question, it was more like she was afraid she couldn't without starting to cry again.

"Mon, do you believe in soul mates?" she asked instead, to Monica's surprise.

"No," Monica answered. "Do you think Joey is your soul mate?"

"I think soul mate isn't the right term. But when I was with him, it always felt as if we were made for one another."

As much as Monica herself had seen for the past month how much they were or had been in love with one another, believing that they were meant to be seemed a little farfetched, to say the least. Still, she didn't want to hurt Rachel even more than she was hurting now, so she just settled for what she thought was a neutral question.

"Because the sex was great?"

Rachel actually chuckled a bit at that and looked up at her.

"Wasn't that the first thing between you and Chandler, too?"

Monica smiled nostalgically. "Yeah, you're right. I guess I forget that sometimes, because it feels like there was always more to it, right from the first night. It was like everything we did together, we did great."

"Mon, that's exactly how I feel about Joey and me," Rachel said so determinedly, Monica just knew it was Rachel's deepest conviction. "We were so great together. So great," she continued while the sadness that lingered around her like a veil of dark mist overtook her tone again. "I still can't believe I've messed that up… for good."

Not for the first time in the last months, Monica cursed that feeling of helplessness she had every time she saw one of them like this. Mourning over something they had lost that had meant the world to them. The frustrating thing was, they were both mourning, they both wanted it back, and she was sure that they could make it happen. Sure, she had been convinced about that after Rachel's breakup with Ross, too. But Rachel and Joey had a lot more going for them. Not least their baby.

Rachel took the tissue Monica offered her and wiped her eyes again. Then she sighed and smiled at her apologetically.

"You must be so sick of hearing that all the time."

Monica just shook her head. "No. But I'd like to hear what's up with the pineapple."

"You don't wanna know that, Mon. Let's just say it's one of the many things, reminding me of how much I miss him."

Monica didn't know what to say to that. Wordlessly she moved in to give Rachel another hug. They stayed like this for a while since Rachel seemed to cling to her, like she needed someone to hold her for a while.

………

Neither Monica nor Rachel noticed someone coming in.

"Hi honey," Chandler greeted his wife cheerfully before he noticed that she wasn't the only person in the room. "Hi… Rachel," he added reluctantly when he realized who the woman was who was hugging Monica. He knew Rachel still visited Monica and he knew they both made sure to avoid him running into Rachel. So maybe he should've told Monica he would come home earlier today.

An awkward silence ensued for a moment, until Rachel took a shuddering breath and slowly got up.

"Hi Chandler," she said in a voice that sounded terrifying small to Chandler. "I better get going. Thanks Monica, for listening to me."

Avoiding looking at him, she headed for the door. It was the first time Chandler actually noticed her pregnancy. There was a clearly noticeable bulge to be seen beneath her sweater. It was the first time he truly realized that Rachel was going to have a baby. Joey's baby. Everything else seemed to pale in comparison to that fact. How could so many other things still matter?

She was going to be the mother of his best friend's baby, he couldn't treat her as if she didn't exist. And to be honest, he didn't want to anymore.

"Rachel, wait," he said when Rachel was almost out the door, surprised at the squeak in his voice. "You don't have to leave because of me."

Rachel stopped in mid-movement and slowly turned around again.

"You don't have to be polite, Chandler. I understand…"

"No, no, Rachel. I… I want you to stay."

Now both his wife and Rachel were disbelievingly staring at him.

"What!" he exclaimed with fake exasperation, "Does everybody think I'm a monster or something?"

"No, but I thought you think I am," Rachel deadpanned which made Chandler smile. He closed the space between them and took her hand, pulling her into the apartment again.

"I did, but now I see how wrong I was. You're… you're a mommy," he said quietly, lightly skimming his hand over her belly. Which was the exact moment Rachel started to burst into tears.

"I'm so sorry, Chandler, I ruined everything. Everything is so messed up, I don't know…"

"Shh," he shushed her while taking her into his arms, letting her sob into his shoulder. It felt natural somehow, at least a lot more natural than being pissed at her. Sure, she had made a mistake, a horrible one. But everyone was allowed to, he himself had made his share of them, and he had always been glad that his friends had forgiven him for it without giving him too much trouble. No one stayed mad at him forever. Rachel hadn't even done something to him, it wasn't his place to be mad at her.

"It's gonna be all right, Rach."

"How, Chandler? I don't think it's ever gonna be all right again."

The hopelessness and the devastation in her voice was disconcerting… and familiar. He knew who sounded exactly like her. Joey.

"He… give him some time, Rach. I have a feeling he won't leave things like they are now. That's not who he is."

"I hope you're right. You have no idea how much I hope you're right."

He patted her back comfortingly while Monica blew him a bunch of kisses and made a few gestures that clearly indicated that he had a big chance to get very lucky that night. He grinned widely at her.

After a while Rachel stopped sniffling and pulled back to favor him with a tortured but genuine smile.

"Thank you, honey. You have no idea how happy it makes me that we're good again."

Chandler lifted his hand and wiped a few tears from Rachel's face. "I was an idiot for being mad at you for so long, it was none of my business."

"He's your friend," Rachel whispered.

His hand sank down to his side and he shrugged, grinning a bit helplessly. "Yeah, but… so are you."

Since Rachel looked as if she was about to start crying again, Chandler tried to change the subject. "So, how's little Joey Jr. doing in there?" he asked, tapping his forefinger against her belly playfully.

That made a little half-hearted smile appear on Rachel's face. "Well, according to the daddy, it's gonna be a Josephine and she's doing great."

Monica came up beside him and looked at Rachel frowning. "Are you really thinking about 'Josephine'?" she asked incredulously.

Rachel shook her head, still smiling a little. "Well, we both love 'Little Women', but... we haven't really talked about names yet."

Chandler found that something else had changed about Rachel. It wasn't just the belly and the sadness, something seemed off somehow. "What about you?" he asked her, "I mean... aside from the relationship disaster?"

Suddenly Rachel seemed to feel the need to avoid her eyes and looked down at her feet. "Well… more or less… fine," she stammered.

She'd always been a terrible liar. Monica had apparently picked up on that, too, because a look of horror darkened the expression on her face. "Rachel! What's 'more or less' supposed to mean? Is there something wrong?"

Rachel looked up sharply and her eyes went from him to Monica and back. "Please you guys, promise me you won't tell anyone, okay," she said.

"What aren't we supposed to tell anyone?" Chandler asked, feeling a bit of dread. He wasn't gonna keep anything from Joey, not if it was about the baby or Rachel.

"Ever since… Joey and I broke up," Rachel began hesitantly, "I haven't had much appetite, so…"

"You've lost weight?" Monica interrupted her sharply and Rachel sighed.

"Yeah, I've lost weight."

It was something that alarmed Monica a lot more than it did Chandler, but then he didn't know anything about pregnancies.

"Rachel, you're not supposed to lose weight, you're pregnant!"

"I know, but…" she said but trailed off, looking at them as if she was asking for help.

"Does Joey know about this?" Chandler asked the question that seemed to be the most important.

"No and, guys, please, _please_ don't tell him. I started eating more lately and I think I can have those few pounds back in no time. The baby is healthy, that's what counts and…"

Chandler interrupted her impatiently. "Rach, he has to know about this."

"Mon…" Rachel started, turning to her best friend but then back to him, "Chandler, please."

Monica shook her head but then she said, "All right, one week. If it hasn't improved by then, we'll tell him."

Chandler wasn't quite happy about that decision, but he decided to listen to Monica. After all, she was almost always right.

* * *

tbc 

Please review.


	12. TOW Dr Ramoray

**TOW Doctor Ramoray**

Joey was eying the contents of the table suspiciously. Catering at DOOL had surely seen better days. Or maybe his appetite wasn't what it used to be, which was a probable explanation too. He bent over the table to snatch the last blueberry muffin, cursing silently when Drake's stethoscope slipped from around his neck and landed on the table. The moment he put it around his neck again and took the first bite out off his muffin, his cell phone rang.

"Hello," he mumbled into the receiver around his mouthful of food.

"Hi, Joey, this is Ross…"

Joey froze and almost choked on his muffin. He hadn't talked to Ross in over three months. That Ross called him on his cell could only mean one thing.

"What's with Rachel?"

"I'm taking her to the hospital right now. I think she has something called Braxton-Hicks contractions. Carol had those, too, it's nothing serious, most women don't even notice them. But Rachel doesn't feel so good, so just to be sure…"

"Which hospital?"

"Joey, I don't think you need to come…"

"WHICH HOSPITAL?" Joey yelled into the phone and everyone around him flinched at hearing him raise his voice like that.

"St. Mary's is the closest one, but…"

Without listening to what Ross had to say, Joey ended the call and headed for the exit of the sound stage.

"Joey!", the director yelled after him. "Where do you think you're going?"

"My girlfriend is going to the hospital, I have to go."

"Joey, you can't go, we'll be going on shooting your scene in five minutes."

"Pete, we did nine takes of this scene already, where do you think we are here? At the set of the next Oscar winning movie?"

He didn't even hear anymore what Pete was yelling after him. He didn't care. All – or everyone – he cared about was on the way to St. Mary's hospital and he was hell bent on being there, too.

The ride in the cab seemed to take forever. It gave him plenty of time to worry about what might have happened to Rachel and to his daughter. It gave him more time than he would've cared about to feel horrible about the fact that it had been Ross of all people who was the one taking care of her right now.

Ross, not him. Again.

He asked himself if he had a choice. If it could be different, if he could be - should be - the one taking care of Rachel and the baby. The answer was surprisingly simple. Of course he should. It was his responsibility. His, not Ross's.

His stream of thoughts was interrupted by the cab coming to a screeching halt.

"Here we are, doctor," the cab driver announced with a proud smile, "in record time".

Only after he had paid the man and gotten out of the cab, Joey noticed why the driver had addressed him like that. He was still wearing his costume. Pushing that thought aside, he rushed into the emergency room and headed for the reception desk.

"I'm looking for Rachel Green. She's five months pregnant and had been brought here suspected of having Braxton-Hicks contractions."

The nurse behind the desk jumped into action at seeing him and looked into the chart in front of her and then back at him, studying the name tag on his coat.

"Miss Green is in room two, Dr. Ramoray," she told him hurriedly, "It's this way, behind the right corner."

He thanked her with a curt nod and ran towards the room. Rounding the corner he crashed into someone who was standing right in front of the elusive room number two.

"Sorry …" he started before he noticed that he had run into no one else but Ross.

Joey straightened his clothes and took a deep breath. He had to be civil. This was neither the right time nor the right place to get into a fight with Ross.

"How is she?" he managed to ask after clearing his throat for what felt like at least three times.

"I don't know. But I don't think you should worry."

"Don't tell me what to worry about," Joey replied gruffly. Ross went silent and took a step back, looking away from him.

'Great', Joey thought, angry at himself, 'So much for being civil.'

Since he wasn't even close to being able to say sorry to the man who was the very reason for this horrible situation, he had to think about something else to break the tension.

"Thanks for bringing her here, though."

Ross stole a quick glance at him and nodded slowly, acknowledging his attempt at a truce.

"No big deal, Joe."

Joey shook his head at this. Ross was wrong, it was a big deal. It should've been him, he was the father after all. Whatever that still meant.

A few moments later the door opened and a doctor came out, turning to Ross.

"You'll be relieved to hear that you were right about Miss Green's discomfort being Braxton-Hicks contractions. She's fine. You still did the right thing by bringing her in, you're gonna make a wonderful father."

With that the doctor patted Ross jovially on the shoulder, turned around and left the two men stunned in his wake.

Joey closed his eyes, defeated. 'Whatever that still means', his thought from before echoed in his brain. Obviously it meant nothing. Not if things stayed like they were now. Not if he wasn't there for her, not if he left it to Ross to take care of her. Being a father was much more than just getting a girl pregnant. Never in his whole life had that been so unmistakably clear to him.

"Joey, I'm so glad you're here," Rachel's voice made him open his eyes again. At least someone was acknowledging his presence.

"How you doin'?" he asked her with a smile and when she smiled back, the world around him started to fade into the background.

"I'm okay. The baby's okay. You know… me and pain. There is a little something going on in my stomach and I start to panic," she said, trying to sound as if it really hadn't been a big deal.

It did nothing to alleviate his unease about the incident at all. He lifted his hand and gingerly touched her cheek. "You sure you're okay, baby?"

Seeing her eyes go wide at his words made him re-examine what he had just said. He let his hand fall to his side again and shook his head sadly, trying to shake off the ghosts from the past.

"I'm fine, Joey, really," Rachel hurriedly answered. Then, in an attempt to lighten the mood, she tapped the nameplate on his coat and said, "Or should I call you Dr. Ramoray?"

"It's Drake for you," he answered, smiling again.

Judging from the look on her face, the dreamy and slightly sad smile, she remembered the occasion when he first had said that to her.

(Flashback to day 48)

Joey was on the way from the sound stage to his dressing room, deep in thought because he couldn't make sense of the fact that Christian Saunders of all people had talked the director into calling it a day.

Although he was glad he had.

The thought that he was going to see Rachel in about half an hour sent a warm wave of happiness through him and a wide smile spread over his face. He never would've believed this. He saw Rachel every day, he had known her for years, they made love almost every night, and yet he couldn't seem to get enough of her. Being with her was like a drug, like an obsession, and it got worse with every day they were together. He mused that the comparison with being on drugs was quite fitting. It felt a bit like a constant intoxication, like a constant high. Not that he was complaining.

Still smiling he stepped into his dressing room and locked the door behind him. When he turned around, he noticed that someone was sitting in his armchair. It was Rachel, wearing one of his shirts and from what he could tell, not much else. She was here. He didn't even need to wait thirty minutes, she was right here – with him.

"Look who's in my dressing room. Security around here isn't what it used to be," he said smiling, taking a step into her direction.

Rachel stood up and put her arms around his neck. "I had a bit of insider help. It's a good thing I'm friends with Chris."

Joey chuckled at the realization why exactly Chris had tried to get him to leave the set. He made a mental note to thank him the next day.

"It's been a while since the last time I had a groupie in my dressing room, so… what do we do now?" he asked while placing light kisses around her ear.

"Well, excuse me, Mr. Tribbiani, but I actually came to see Dr. Ramoray."

He pulled back a little, looking at her quizzically. At seeing her mischievous smile he decided to play along.

"It's Drake to you," he said in his best 'Dr. Ramoray' voice.

"Well, Drake… I hope what I'm gonna tell you falls under doctor patient confidentiality."

"Of course it does. What's the problem?"

Rachel stepped back a bit and slowly started to unbutton the shirt she was wearing. "I think it's something with my heart. Sometimes it starts to beat really fast and I can barely breathe and my stomach feels as if butterflies are in it."

She shrugged out of the shirt, revealing her gorgeous body, clad in some very sexy light blue lingerie. Looking like the picture of innocence, she let her hands roam over her chest and down her belly.

"And I don't even wanna tell you what happens further south," she crooned sexily.

Joey swallowed a few times to get himself back under control.

"Does it…" he squeaked and tried again, "Does it happen all the time or just… on specific occasions?"

"Well … there is this man I'm going out with – my boyfriend – and it only happens when I'm thinking about him or… when I'm with him."

Joey could barely hide his delight at hearing her say that, it got to him every time. Still, he tried to put on a straight face and went back to being who she obviously wanted him to be.

"I see. This is a very serious condition you have here. I'm afraid… you're in love."

"You think?" Rachel gasped as if being shocked.

"It appears to be the case. And since love is a very infectious disease, I'm pretty sure that boyfriend of yours has it too. In fact, I know he has."

Rachel stepped close to him again, looking deeply into his eyes.

"Do you know what I can do about that, Drake?"

He took her into his arms and started kissing her neck. "There is nothing you can do against it," he said between kisses. "But you can do… someone."

Rachel moaned quietly but when he moved in to kiss her on her mouth, she pulled back a little. "Can you stop being Drake now? It feels like I'm cheating on my boyfriend," she smiled.

"I was going to get out of these clothes anyway," he said while getting rid of his coat, taking off his shirt too while he was at it.

"Hi Rachel," he whispered after he turned back to her.

"Hi Joey," she smiled back. "I'm so glad to see you."

"Right back at ya," he murmured while lightly tracing the outline of her bra with his index finger. "I've missed you. I know it has only been a few hours but…"

The rest of his sentence was cut short by Rachel pressing a fervent and demanding kiss on his lips. He figured they were done talking now and kissed her back, showing her what he had intended to say.

A while later they lay on the couch, Rachel's head resting on his chest, and he was letting his hand roam over her naked body. It was one of the many things he found himself doing with her that he had never done with any other woman. He had never felt the need to touch a woman after having sex. It had always felt as if there was no need for that.

"I love it when you touch me like that," Rachel whispered as if she had read his thoughts.

"Which is a good thing, because I wouldn't know how to stop."

"Then don't. I can't imagine how I could ever exist without you touching me. If you ever stop touching me, I guess I would just wither away and die, like a flower without water."

He snickered at that. "Sounds like right out of one of those books you're hiding under your bed."

Rachel chuckled. "Yeah, it is," she half whispered, half sighed and snuggled even closer to him.

Feeling the same notion, Joey drew her closer with one arm, his fingertips still restlessly roaming her skin. It occurred to him that he somehow liked the thought of being so important to her, of her needing him that much.

"Is it true, though?" he asked a little bashfully.

Her answer came without hesitation in form of a content sigh.

"It is."

(End flashback)

Usually, when he remembered the blissful happiness they had lived in for those seven weeks, an unbearable sense of loss threatened to overwhelm him. But being able to look into her eyes, to see that those memories still meant something to her, too, made him happy somehow. Maybe it was hope that flickered up inside him at that, hope that like Monica had said, things weren't completely lost.

They were standing so close already, their bodies almost touched. He barely needed to move his hand at all to be able to grasp hers and gently caress the back of her hand with his thumb. Rachel closed her eyes for a second and when she looked back, hope was shining out of her eyes, too.

"It's still true, Joey," she whispered softly.

He kept staring at her until a voice from somewhere reached his ear.

"Hey uh, can I… uh… can I talk to you guys for a second?" Ross asked haltingly.

"What's up, Ross?" Rachel asked, sounding slightly irritated.

Ross gestured for them to sit down and they both did. Joey felt a hint of unease about what Ross was going to say, and a lot more than a hint of irritation at the interruption of… what had happened between them. Although he wasn't even sure what that had been.

"I want to talk about our situation," Ross started, shuffling his feet. "Well, the thing is... 'cause I live with Rachel I'm here for a lot of the baby stuff, okay?"

Both Rachel and Joey nodded mutely at that obvious observation.

"And Joey... Joey is missing everything."

Again, the truth of that statement was undeniable. Although Joey started to wonder where Ross was going with this. He hoped he didn't just say that to rub in what kind of a terrible father he was going to be.

"Maybe you two should try to live together again," Ross said finally, and judging by the look on his face, he expected them to say something to this.

Joey couldn't. It wasn't like he hadn't thought about that countless times, but it felt useless to think about it as long as he didn't know what Rachel's opinion was about moving in with him again.

"Are you asking me to move out?" he heard her asking, which confirmed his suspicions. She didn't want to move out of Ross's apartment.

"Oh no, no I love living with you. It just seems that... if you're gonna have a roommate, you know, it might as well be the father."

Joey couldn't help but look at Ross in surprise.

"I would love to live with you again, Joey," Rachel said quietly, turning back to him, the hope in her eyes even more palpable than before. "Having you around for everything. And we… we can just try it, like, on a temporary basis."

"But Rachel, it's you and me," he tried to remind her. Not so much because that would be a problem for him, but because he thought it might be one for her. There were a lot of unresolved issues between them and living together was a sure way to bring them up all the time.

"I know but it… it wouldn't be anything romantic. At least not if you don't want it to be."

There it was again, this non-commitment of hers that left him wondering how much their 'romance' had ever meant to her.

"All right now, so …What do you think?"

Ross's question cut his thought process short. But he still didn't know what to think because he didn't know what Rachel thought. What her reasons were for wanting to live with him besides having the father of the baby around. If what he had felt before, if what he thought he had seen in her eyes, was really there.

"Ross, can you give us a minute? I need to talk to Rachel alone, okay?" he finally managed and Ross nodded.

"Yeah, sure. I'll be out there trying to get us a cab."

Ross was barely out of earshot when Rachel turned to him, suddenly visibly upset.

"Joey, I swear I didn't tell him to do that, I had no idea he would suggest that. And if you don't want to, just tell me, okay? I don't expect… anything."

The thought that she could've planned something like this with Ross made him smile for some reason. It was almost flattering to imagine her coming up with such an intricate plan just to get to live with him again, where she just could've asked.

"I know you didn't know, I could tell by the noise your jaw made when it hit the floor."

His remark was intended to put her at ease, to make her smile again, but she was still looking pensive.

"If you need time to think about it…" she said quietly.

"Rach, I know I want to live with you, I know I want to be around for you and the baby. I really want to feel like I'm gonna be a father, not just like my ex-girlfriend is gonna have a baby."

That finally made her lips curl just a little in the tiniest of smiles.

"So you wanna try?"

"I wanna try living with you again…" he confirmed and decided that now was probably as good a moment as any to ask what he had meant to from the moment he had sent Ross away. "But… what about… what you said before, that it's still true?"

Rachel didn't seem to need time to think about this.

"It is. But you make the rules. If you want it to be nothing romantic, it won't be. We're gonna be just friends, just roommates. I promise."

It occurred to him that there was probably no way to get her to say what he wanted to hear without him telling her that it actually _was_ what he wanted to hear. But for some reason, he couldn't bring himself to ask. After everything that had happened, asking her if _she_ still wanted it to be something romantic suddenly seemed stupid. In a way, he knew she did. In a way, he knew that it was him who had to make the first move.

He took a deep breath and settled for, "So when do you think you can move in?"

Excitement suddenly clearly shone out of her eyes, but for some reason she fought it down.

"Tomorrow?" she finally asked tentatively. "I mean, if that's all right with you."

Now it was him who had to try to keep the excitement that suddenly bubbled up inside of him out of his voice when he gave back "Yeah, tomorrow would be great."

* * *

tbc 

Please tell me what you think.


	13. TOW they're still friends

**A/N:**Thanks to all my faithful reviewers.

* * *

**TOW they're still friends**

Joey sat down in front of his friend who put down the newspaper he was reading. He nervously fidgeted with the salt shaker on the table before Chandler prompted him.

"What is it you want to tell me, Joe?"

Joey took a deep breath and looked up at Chandler unsure. "Rachel is gonna move in with me again."

Chandler's face didn't betray a thing about what he thought. "Okay. Anything else?"

"You're not gonna tell me this is a mistake? Or that I should think about it again?"

Chandler seemed to have to think about that for a while, and then he leaned a bit forward to be closer to Joey. "Look Joey, a few weeks ago, I probably would have told you exactly that. But now... I don't know anymore. First of all, in the end, it's your decision. If this is what you want, who am I to tell you you're making a mistake?"

"What if I asked you?"

"Okay, so here is what I think. Remember what you told me when I was with Janice?"

"That I wanted to throw my arm at her?"

"No, that I should bow out and let her get together with her husband again because they were a family. I mean, you two have a child on the way, you could be... a family. It's not just about the two of you anymore. I think it's worth trying."

"Yeah... it is. That's what I thought."

"And then... a few days ago I saw Rachel. She looked... Joey, I've never seen her look like that, even after she broke up with Ross. She looks every bit as broken and sad as you do. I couldn't even be mad at her anymore, I just... felt sorry for her. If you two can fix it..."

"Chan, I don't know if I want to fix it. I don't know if I can, if I have that in me. But I know I don't want her to live at Ross's or somewhere else. They are my responsibility."

"But you shouldn't just do it because you feel responsible. If living with her again hurts you..."

"No, I don't think it would hurt me. At least not more than living without her does."

"So you think it's worth trying?"

"Yeah, I think it is."

"Then you should try it."

………

(Week 23 of pregnancy)

When Chandler came home from work, both the doors to the apartments 19 and 20 stood open. He would've had helped Rachel to move in with Joey again, but he had to go to work, and seeing his wife excitedly helping Rachel to put all her stuff back to where it had been before made him realize that probably he would only have been in their way anyway.

Joey seemed to be trying not to be in Monica's way, too, but the quiet happiness he exuded made Chandler smile to himself. Maybe things weren't as messed up as they had seemed to be a few months ago.

"Hey, I hope you left some work for me," he said loudly while entering the apartment.

Everyone turned to him and smiled. Monica came over and gave him a smacking kiss. "We thought it would be better to be done before you had your chance to break things."

"Hey," he complained, knowing she was right.

"Hi, Chandler," Rachel smiled at him and he smiled back at her. There was still something hovering around her like a dark cloud. Her eyes still didn't sparkle like they used to, but he hoped that maybe Joey would manage to bring that back eventually.

"Hey dude," Joey greeted him, and slapped him on his shoulder a bit too firmly for his taste.

Chandler turned to him and said, "Seems like it was a really good idea you had, to move in together again."

To his surprise, Joey sighed at that and looked down at his feet. "Can't take credit for that one. I mean, I had thought about it and Rach had too," at that he turned his head and looked at Rachel, who nodded in confirmation. "But it was Ross who brought it up, who actually made us talk about it."

Chandler tensed up and felt his stomach clench at the mention of the name of his former long-time best friend. He shook his head to get rid of the weird feelings coursing through him, but when they persisted, he turned and went over to the other apartment. He put his briefcase on the kitchen chair and felt himself drawn to the big window, staring over at Ross's apartment. Ross was busy putting his stuff back into the places Rachel had vacated.

Ever since he had forgiven Rachel, he had thought about getting things right with Ross again. They had seen each other on occasion at the coffeehouse, but they had barely talked at all, and then only about superficial things. He didn't feel like he had to apologize, but he wanted him to know that they were still friends. He just hadn't figured out how to approach him about that.

A gentle hand was placed on his shoulder and he felt the tension drain out of him at the feeling of his wife's presence beside him.

"Do you want to talk to him?" she asked quietly.

"I really think I should."

"Then do it. Right now would be a perfect opportunity. I think he might be happy to know that he still has friends left."

He turned to Monica and swept her into a tight hug. "You're right as always," he murmured into her ear, which earned him a passionate kiss that promised a lot more.

"I'll wait for you to come back," she purred with a familiar glint in her eyes.

He let her out of his arms reluctantly and headed out of the apartment.

………

Ross's door stood open; someone had probably forgotten to close it behind them.

"Knock, knock," he said before he stepped in and Ross, in the middle of putting some stones onto a shelf, spun round to him.

"Hi," he said tentatively, looking down at his feet.

"Hi," Chandler greeted back, feeling painfully at a loss for words. It was clearly a situation where he would normally have a joke handy, but he doubted that Ross would appreciate that much.

"So, she's all moved out, huh?" he asked rather stupidly, knowing the answer already.

"Yeah," Ross answered shortly, turning back to his stones again.

"I think you did the right thing," Chandler finally said.

Ross turned around again and shrugged helplessly, while gesturing for Chandler to take a seat on the couch.

"I wish I had done it a few months ago," he said after sitting down next to him.

Chandler asked the one question that had been on his mind for months. The one thing he couldn't wrap his mind around. "Why didn't you?"

"I thought that this is where she belongs. Here… with me. It took me far too long to realize that she stopped belonging to me a long time ago."

"What made you realize that?"

"Seeing those two in the hospital. I mean… before… I couldn't understand what they felt for each other, what was between them. I kinda thought – and I know how stupid it sounds now – that they could never have what she and I had, that he could never give her what I could give her. They always seemed more like brother and sister than anything else and – let's face it – he's Joey… it was just so incomprehensible."

Chandler nodded along. Just like anybody else – from what he had gathered, Phoebe and Monica thought about it almost the same way – he had never considered Joey and Rachel a possibility. Learning that they had obviously been so much in love was still something that he could barely believe. If it wasn't for the quiet desperation both of them showed so visibly, if it wasn't for Rachel's growing belly, it would still feel unreal that they had been a couple once.

"Anyway," Ross interrupted his musings, "…in the hospital, they were standing there, not even talking, just looking at each other and holding hands and… it was… it was like there was this invisible wall going up, separating them from the rest of the world. And I… I was definitely on the other side of that wall."

Again, that was something Chandler could empathize with. He'd felt that often enough over the past months. If he thought about it long enough, he had even felt it sometimes before he knew that they were together.

"You think they're gonna get back together?" he mused aloud, not even expecting an answer. It might even have been somewhat insensitive to ask Ross that question.

"God, I hope so," Ross replied, apparently without having to think about it. "They're so much in love and… they seem to be themselves only when they're together. I don't think I could live with myself, knowing that I had wrecked that for them."

Chandler shook his head, thinking back to the many times he had almost screwed up his relationship with Monica, sometimes even with the best of intentions.

"Blech … love. Makes you do the stupidest things," he stated with mock disgust.

Ross chuckled. "Couldn't agree more."

Chandler heaved an inward sigh of relief that the lightness was back so easily between them. Without many words, without long explanations and apologies. He just wanted it to be behind them and so, it seemed, did Ross.

"Would be boring without it, though," Chandler mused.

"Yeah, you're right. Boring and… kinda pointless, too," Ross said while getting up and vanishing into his kitchen.

He came back with two beers, handed him one and sat down again. They drank their beers in comfortable silence. As Chandler stole a glance up to his apartment, he could see a dark haired head vanishing quickly out of his sight. It made him smile.

"So, you think you're gonna fall in love again sometime?" he asked Ross after a while.

"Definitely," Ross stated with so much conviction, Chandler couldn't help but believe him.

He raised his beer in Ross's direction and said, "To love."

Ross clinked his bottle against his and said, "To friendship," while favoring him with a small and thankful smile.

* * *

tbc 


	14. TOW they start to talk

**TOW they start to talk **

Rachel lay awake in her bed, unwilling and unable to sleep. Her first night in her old, new, home and she stared at her ceiling, wondering why Joey and she had never had sex in this room. She practically hadn't slept in her room ever since that first night.

She asked herself why that particular fact seemed important enough for her to puzzle over it, until she decided it wasn't. Absent-mindedly caressing her belly, she tried to come up with something else to think about, to divert her thoughts from the one direction they seemed inevitably drawn in to. Keeping herself from thinking about Joey sleeping in the room right next to hers.

Of course, that thought was reassuring somehow. It was good to know that he was so close. It had been what seemed so unbearable while living at Ross's, that he was so out of her reach. On the other hand, knowing he was so close also proved to be a constant temptation, a constant reason to fight the overwhelming wish to go over and snuggle into his embrace as she had done only a few months ago, even if now it seemed to be a lifetime away. But again, through all the grief over that, moving back in with him seemed to offer a ray of hope and she knew she wouldn't do anything to jeopardize that. So as much as she wanted to be as close to him as possible, even more than that she wanted to keep to his rules.

Sighing she got up to get herself something to drink, maybe even watch a bit TV or something to distract herself.

When she stepped outside her room, she was surprised to find Joey asleep on the lounger, and even more surprised to see that he apparently hadn't fallen asleep in front of the TV, because 'Stevie' was turned off. Looking even more closely, she saw that he had brought a pillow from his bed. Everything seemed to indicate that he had intended to sleep on the lounger.

The blanket he had covered himself with had slipped down and lay on the floor, and Joey was curled together, shivering a bit in his sleep.

Smiling, Rachel remembered finding him almost exactly like this on their first night, and she carefully picked up the blanket and covered him again. When the blanket touched Joey's body, he bolted upright, just like back then, only now Rachel had anticipated that and moved backwards.

"Geez, Rachel, you scared me," he mumbled sleepily.

"I'm sorry, Joe. I just… you seemed to be cold."

He wrapped the blanket closely around himself and attempted a tired smile. Then he rubbed his eyes while replying, "Yeah, I was. Thanks. Stupid blanket keeps slipping down."

"Why are you sleeping out here?" she asked the obvious question.

Joey froze and put his hands down, avoiding looking at her.

"Uhm… I'm not sleeping that good in my bed anymore," he finally admitted quietly.

She didn't need to ask any more questions; she knew what he meant. Too many memories. It was one of the reasons she had been glad at first, not to have to live in this apartment for a while.

"At first I fell asleep while watching TV and then I got used to it, I guess," he continued.

"It's not the first time I've found you like this," she said rather unnecessarily. He surely remembered that night, too well.

"Yeah," he said with the hint of a smile in his voice, "Only this time, I didn't hurt you."

"No," she agreed tonelessly, "You didn't."

He didn't reply anything, but she was shocked speechless when he took her hand in his. His touch felt so good, the warmth of his strong hand so comforting, her resolve to resist him, to keep to his rules, melted like snow in the spring sun. Just at that moment, a very intense sensation inside her belly made her gasp. She had felt the baby moving around inside her before, but it was always some soft, bubbly feeling that couldn't be felt from outside. Now there was definite kicking.

"What is it?" Joey asked concerned.

"Baby's kicking," she whispered, as if talking too loud could make it stop.

Joey looked up at her with a mixture of a plea and hesitation. She wrapped her fingers around his hand that was holding hers and placed it on her belly, right over the spot where she had felt the movement. Doing that, she couldn't resist the urge to leave her hand over his, lightly weaving her fingers through his, just enjoying this unexpected and so very welcome closeness. As the baby kicked again, Joey gasped, too.

"God, this is so amazing," he whispered just like she had done, but now it made her smile.

"You don't need to whisper," she encouraged him. "Maybe she wants to hear her daddy's voice."

Joey reluctantly scooted a bit closer to her and crouched down so his head was level with her belly. "Hi, baby," he said, "I'm Joey, I'm… I'm your daddy. You and your mom, well… you're living with me… again… so… I guess we're gonna hear from each other more often in the future." He suddenly pulled back and shook his head, apparently dissatisfied with himself. Then the baby kicked again, even more vigorously than before. "She thinks I'm an idiot," Joey remarked dryly.

"No," Rachel objected, "She… she likes you."

Joey left his hand on her belly for a while longer, but the kicking stopped just as abruptly as it had started, and much to her dismay he eventually pulled his hand back.

"You've never told me how you feel about having her, about having my baby," he suddenly asked, taking her by surprise again.

"I still don't know that, Joey" she answered truthfully. "On one hand, I always wanted kids, and after Monica's wedding I sometimes even fantasized about having your baby. Maybe I already knew on some level, but the thought of being pregnant with your child always made me happy. But on the other hand, I can't stop thinking that if I hadn't gotten pregnant we would still be together. It makes me think that getting pregnant made me lose you, and I'm so not happy about that."

Joey looked up at her indignantly, his mouth pressed together into a grim line, anger plainly visible in his eyes. "You lost me because you slept with Ross, not because you're pregnant. You know that," he said in a tone that was more questioning but accusing.

"But nothing would've happened, if I hadn't been pregnant," she tried to make him see her reasoning.

"Don't you think it would've happened anyway? I mean, you told Monica you needed to close that door and everything."

She didn't even need to think about what to say to that. She had rehearsed that speech in her head over and over again and sudden felt glad somehow to finally have the chance to tell him.

"Joey, the one thing I needed to do was talk to Ross. Tell him that I didn't love him anymore. That didn't even have anything to do with you. Being in love with you just made me realize that, but I fell out of love with Ross a long time before things between you and me even started. What Ross and I needed to do was acknowledge that we were over. Because that is what he felt, too. He wasn't in love me any more than I was with him. He was in love with the idea of being back together with me. Me telling him that I was in love with someone else made him see that. Being pregnant made me emotional and confused and vulnerable, and that was not the ideal state of mind to have that conversation. That was why everything went downhill from there."

Joey still looked at her with knitted eyebrows. "So you two did it _after_ you told him you were in love with me?"

It was stunning how precisely he managed to cut through her bullshit, her carefully woven construct to explain her failure away. How he stripped it down to the one bare fact that still made it an inexcusable betrayal.

"Yeah, we did. I'm sorry," she finally whispered around the lump in her throat.

He still didn't seem mollified and still looked angry. "And now you're blaming it on her?"

Finally she caught on what had made him so angry. It was the thought that she tried to blame someone else – his child of all people – for her own mistake.

"I'm not blaming it on her," she hastened to assure him. With a pitiful crack in her voice she added, "I know it's my fault and only my fault."

His expression softened considerably as he watched her frantically wiping her eyes and it almost looked as if he was sorry for pushing her like that.

"Rach, I…" he started, but she waved off his attempt at apologizing and tried to smile through her tears.

"It's okay, Joey. I know what you feel. I felt it too, once. And that's the worst part of it. I know how pointless it is to hope you'll get over this, because I never could."

He shook his head, sighing and averted his eyes.

"Rachel, what … what if it had been me? If I had lost my head for a moment after learning we were going to have a baby; if I had slept with some woman…"

Jealousy flashed through her with an intensity that knocked the breath out of her. The urge to kill, to hurt anyone who even came close to touching the man she loved cemented a devastating realization that she had carried as an unfinished and painful thought inside her head ever since the moment she had known he knew about her betrayal.

After a resigned sigh she replied quietly, "That's what I mean. I can't imagine having been able to forgive you for that. I know I can't expect it from you."

She saw him looking down at his hands and from the way his jaw muscles clenched she knew he was struggling to find something to say to that. Wanting to spare him the useless effort, she got up and gently caressed his hair before she turned to her room.

"Good night, Joe."

………

Rachel felt drained. Ever since she'd moved in with Joey again she had had the feeling that she was getting back on her feet again, but today's meeting with her father had been more than taxing.

Monica smiled at her brightly when she stepped into the apartment and Chandler – in a completely unfamiliar fashion – even pulled a chair out for her so she could sit down comfortably.

"So," Monica said, looking expectantly and put a cup of tea in front of her, "What did he say?"

"Well," she said, trying to sound in control. "_Say_ might not be the right word, _'yell'_ would be more fitting."

"That bad?"

"He wasn't so much mad about me being pregnant, but when I told him I didn't want him to know who the father is, he completely lost it."

Shuddering she remembered every detail of the conversation she had had half an hour ago. It had actually been a surprise that he had kept up the appearance of calm seeing her come to his table obviously pregnant, but things had definitely degraded from then on.

"Why didn't you tell him?" Monica wondered aloud. "I mean, he's your father, and everyone else knows, even your mother. How long do you think you can keep it from him anyway?"

"It's not that I want to keep it from him, but… I don't want him to bother Joey. He has enough on his mind as it is."

Chandler looked puzzled. "Why would he bother Joey?"

"Because… he's expecting the father of the baby to marry me and when I told him that this isn't likely to happen…" Rachel sighed at her own lie. Because that wasn't exactly what she had told her father. For some reason, she hadn't been able to bring herself to admit defeat to him. To admit that it had been her fault that there was no chance her and the father of her child would ever get married.

She shook her head, tired of lying. Even knowing that Monica wouldn't let her get away with that, she opted for telling her the truth.

"Well, I told him that the father and I have a few… relationship problems we have to work through before we're gonna think about marriage, and that I don't want him to interfere."

Monica raised an eyebrow. "Relationship problems? Rachel, I really don't want to poke into the wound, but there isn't a relationship. You have to tell your father that sooner or later."

Avoiding Monica's intense gaze, Rachel looked down at her hands, nervously twisting her fingers together.

"Maybe… there will be one again sometime," she told her hands.

Monica gasped a little which made Rachel look up at her.

"Is there… is there anything we don't know?"

Rachel shook her head sadly. "No… no there isn't, but… "

Monica had reached over the table and took her hand, forcing her to look up at her.

"What?" Monica asked softly and in a tone that assured Rachel that she wasn't judging or trying to tell her what to do.

"I can't give up on what we had…" she tried to explain what was but a feeling to her, even if it was a strong one. "I can't give up on him, you know? I just can't."

"What are you going to do?"

"I have no idea. I just need to make him understand that it is him I want to be with. And not just because of the baby."

The beeping of a timer prompted Monica to let go of her hand and busying herself with making tea.

With Monica's back turned to her, it seemed to be easier to ask the one question that had been on her mind lately.

"Do you… uh… did he… you know… uh… go out or anything lately?"

Certainly the way she had gotten that question out did nothing to make it seem casual or breezy. And the way Monica froze in her movements did nothing to put her at ease about the subject. Nor did Chandler, falling all over himself, trying to leave the room.

Monica turned to her after what seemed like a long time. "Not that he'd said anything," she said at length. "But…"

"But what?" Rachel prompted her impatiently.

"Rachel, it's been a few months," Monica replied evasively. "… and… I mean, he's just a guy and…" She seemed to search for the right words before she looked at her, apparently pleading for her to understand what she was trying to say when she added, "and… he's Joey."

The simplicity of the statement left nothing else to say. Monica was right. It had been after all, something that had constantly been on her mind for the first weeks of their relationship.

(Flashback day 15)

The room was silent save for the sound of labored breath from two people.

"Wow," she whispered breathlessly. "And I thought that was a myth."

"Well, you're not the first woman to think that."

Without even looking at him Rachel could sense him flinch at his own words. Fifteen days of carefully steering clear of the subject of Joey's former lifestyle choices had done nothing to make her feel comfortable with the topic. And she knew that it weighed on Joey, too. Often enough over the past years had she scolded him for the way he treated women. And now, with him claiming to have left that behind, he went out of his way to avoid everything that made him look like the man he had been before. But unexplainable even to herself, she started to miss his leering, sexist, carefree self that often had had her rolling her eyes. It seemed that this was obviously as much a part of him as his sweetness and loyalty. It was what made him Joey, what made him the man she had chosen to be with.

So it seemed like it was about time to get the problem out into the open.

"How many were there? How many women… before me?" she asked tentatively, dreading the answer. She felt the movement of a shrug beside her.

"I don't know… I haven't kept count. I guess it's somewhere around… three hundred… maybe."

"Oh boy," was everything she could come up with as a response before she fell silent, contemplating that number. Broaching the subject also meant having to confront how she felt about his past, deciding if it was something she could live with.

"It's a lot, huh?" Joey asked after a few minutes of silence.

His slightly insecure tone alerted her to the fact that she might frighten him with her silence, but since she still didn't know what to think, she settled for confirming his question. "Yeah, it's a lot." To avoid another stretch of uncomfortable silence, she asked the first question that popped into her head. "I mean… how can I be special amongst three hundred women?"

Only after the words were out did she realize, how incredibly self-centered that sounded. But Joey, being the sweet guy he was, turned over to her, slightly caressing her face, looking as if he was surprised she still even allowed him the gesture. "You would be special amongst a million."

She smiled at the words but for some reason, a little voice inside of her demanded even more proof and elaboration on that fact.

"I don't know. You know, with Ross… I knew the two women he could compare me with and … one of them was a lesbian… so with three hundred…"

Again, she wished she hadn't quite put it that way. Bringing Ross into this was a sure way to make the conversation even more uncomfortable. Or so she thought.

"Try to see it this way…" Joey said unperturbed. "With Ross, you came out first out of three, one of them not even qualified for the competition. With me, you come out first of three hundred."

It was an appealing thought, and it even made sense. But since she still tried to find out what she was feeling, she fell silent again.

"Look Rach," Joey began again. "I can't change what's in the past. If this is a problem…"

At hearing the sadness in his voice, something suddenly occurred to her. The question here wasn't what she felt about three hundred women. The question was what she felt about Joey. If she did – or did not – want to be with him. And her gut reaction to the thought of not wanting to be with him answered that question pretty clearly.

"No no, Joey, it's not a problem. I mean… I always thought it would be one, or it should be… but in my heart… in my heart I know it isn't. Because I know I'm special for you. Not because you said it, but because you make me feel special. You really do. And I'm sorry I brought up Ross again. He can't compare to you… he was only with three women and that didn't prevent him from breaking my heart."

Joey stared at her with wide eyes, obviously taken by surprise by her sudden outburst after being quiet for so long. She shook her head, smiling at herself.

"What I want to say is…," she said gently, while lifting her hand to smooth the furrows of his frown off his forehead. "It doesn't matter what's in the past… as long as it stays there."

His answer was a heartbreakingly sweet kiss.

"I was kinda dreading this conversation," he admitted after breaking the contact that had just started to make her want more. "I know that… couldn't have been easy."

Since the kiss had quenched her desire for conversation, she looked for a way to bring it to a smooth end.

"Joe, it's… it's who you are and I… like who you are. Besides… all that experience has its advantages," she grinned, suggestively wriggling her eyebrows.

"You haven't even seen the half of it, baby," he grinned back.

"Then why don't you show me?" she challenged.

With a quick movement he was over her, moving in for a kiss that promised to be not quite as tender as the one before.

"I was just waiting for you to ask," were the last coherent words spoken for a long while afterwards.

(End flashback)

"Rachel?"

Monica's concerned question brought her back to her dreadful reality. Thinking back to what they had been talking about she heaved a miserable sigh.

"Yeah, he's Joey. You're probably right. And it's none of my business anymore anyway."

* * *

A/N: Please review and let me know what you think. 


	15. TOW the hospital

**A/N:** Enjoy and review.

* * *

**TOW the hospital**

A look at her watch alerted Rachel to the undeniable fact that she was late for work – again. She had excused herself with morning sickness for a while now, she really ought to come in on time at least every once in a while.

But since she had just eaten breakfast, she still needed to put on some lipstick before she went. She figured that she probably left the color that went with her outfit in the bathroom. She headed in there, located it behind Joey's aftershave and was just about to open it, when someone drew back the shower curtain and was about to step out of the bathtub.

Joey.

Her jaw dropped, her eyes went wide and her gaze roamed over his body. This well shaped body with its well defined muscles, broad chest and flat stomach. The body covered with smooth, now deliciously wet skin that she had touched every square inch of. Skin she knew the feel of, the taste. Skin she wasn't supposed to touch or kiss anymore.

Skin, if she thought about it, she wasn't even supposed to look at. The thought went through her like a knife and she pressed her hand over her mouth to prevent herself from giving voice to the embarrassment and pain she felt right now.

She turned away hurriedly and headed out of the door. Once outside, another bout of pain forced her to stop moving and lean against the nearest wall to catch her breath. When she could concentrate on something else again, panic began to rise inside her. What if Joey didn't believe she hadn't done it on purpose? What if he felt her invading his privacy like that was against their rules? What if he couldn't get over her staring at him like a psycho?

The pain hit her again and this time she had to squeeze her eyes shut and ball her hands into tight fists to try to get through it. Opening them again, she saw Joey standing in front of her, looking at her with the hint of a smile.

"God… Joey," she stammered, "I am so sorry. I didn't mean… I didn't know you were in there, I swear."

Joey looked down and shook his head. Her sight was still a little blurry from having squeezed her eyes shut before, so she couldn't interpret his expression, so she rambled on. "And… and… I wasn't meaning to stare. I was just… I was surprised that you were there, I swear I didn't…"

She was cut off by another sharp stab of agony, but that ebbed up pretty quickly when she saw Joey smiling genuinely at her.

"Rach, I might have a few problems, you know… up there," he said, tapping his finger against his forehead, "But I still can appreciate it if a woman can't take her eyes off me when she sees me naked," he finished with a winning grin.

Rachel heaved a sigh of relief and smiled back at him lightly, nodding. For a few more seconds, Joey stood before her, half naked, still dripping wet, and she had to use all her willpower not to let her eyes wander again. He looked into her eyes searchingly, then shook his head as if to chase away a thought, turned around and headed for his room.

A question suddenly popped into her brain, something she had meant to ask him since Monica had suggested she should. She figured that this was as good an opportunity as any.

"Were there any women seeing you naked lately?" she asked, trying to sound as casual as possible.

He didn't answer for the longest time, until she started to think he might not even have heard her. That would be better anyway. She didn't even know why she had asked. There was no good answer to that question. Just thinking he might have slept with someone else was gut wrenchingly painful, and trying to imagine him being so distraught over their breakup that he hadn't had sex in over four months wasn't any better.

She turned around to go to the bathroom when she heard his voice behind her.

"What if there were?"

The way this sounded, the fact that he hadn't answered her for that long, the look in his eyes when she turned around, convinced her that there had been other women after her.

Of course, Monica was right. After all, he was just a man – and he was Joey. The realization felt like a knife cutting through her belly – again. She stumbled forward and gripped the back of the lounger, digging her fingers so hard into its upholstery that they started to hurt. Gasping for air, she tried to come up with something to say. Something that wouldn't betray her feelings. But the more she thought about that, the more the blinding pain inside her rendered her unable to speak.

"What if I slept with other women?" he pushed, and looked at her with such a cold and almost cruel expression that she felt utterly defenseless. "How would that make you feel? Would you hold that against me?"

"I wouldn't. I would have no right to," she stammered tonelessly.

She started to wonder about the pain she felt. It didn't even feel like the usual heartache, it was something in her lower body, some unfamiliar, burning sensation that almost forced her to her knees. But she was determined to show him that she could handle whatever he had done, even when he told her this with a cruelty highly unusual for him.

"Why? Because you don't care anymore, or because you feel that it evens the score between us?"

Her vision began to blur and it was probably because there were tears all over her face, which she tried to wipe away, but she couldn't stop them because that pain just kept getting worse.

"No…"

Joey was looking at her furiously, letting her feel the full force of his anger, letting her see the devastation her betrayal had wrought upon his formerly sweet and forgiving nature. Just when she thought for a moment that the pain was going away again, it came back with a vengeance. She finally realized that it came from her uterus. And now she understood why the doctor had called the Braxton-Hicks contractions 'mild discomfort' because this… this was torture.

A high pitched wail pushed its way out of her and she doubled over, clutching her belly, moaning in pain. As she was able to look up at him, because the pain subsided a bit again, his expression had changed from anger to unadulterated terror.

"Oh my God, Rach, what is it? What's with you? Please…"

He rushed to her side and tried to haul her up, but another wave of pain let her slump against him, crying out again.

"Joey… the baby… the baby…"

………

Joey was sure that he had just lived through the longest hour of his whole life. He used to think that only his dentist could manage to prolong time, but right now he would've gladly gotten a root treatment without anesthetic, in exchange for having to pace up and down the ER waiting room, not knowing what was happening to the two most important people in his life. He still wondered how he had been able to get her into a cab and to the hospital, without giving in to the panic he felt. Rachel had stopped screaming, but she had moaned and cried the whole time, gripping his hands so tightly he could already see the bruises forming there.

And as if that wasn't bad enough, he had never felt so guilty about anything ever before. He knew he had been unfair, he knew he had let himself go. He was appalled by his sudden wish to hurt her like she'd hurt him, and even more appalled by the fact that he hadn't even stopped when he could see that she was in pain.

Her question had hit a sore spot, had made him vulnerable. He hadn't slept with any woman since he broke up with Rachel, and he perceived that as a weakness. It had been almost five months; he should at least have been able to have sex again. If Ross or Chandler had told him they were so hung up on a woman that they didn't touch anyone else for months, he would've laughed in their faces.

He had been on a few dates before the day Rachel came to him and tried to kiss him. It never went very far, and he'd found out that he couldn't bring himself to take the slightest interest in the girls he was going out with, so he decided to wait a while. After the disaster, he couldn't shake off the horrible images of her and Ross. Even when he jerked off, they were always in his head. Trying to sleep with some girl would've probably ended in a disaster as well.

It was so bad that he had honestly considered seeing a shrink, but he couldn't really bring himself to do that, especially since it seemed to have gotten slightly better since Rachel began living with him again.

Only now, instead of noticing that she was in pain, he had taken his anger out on her. Anger that was not even directed at her. Because, although he'd never told her, he had forgiven her for what she had done. He knew enough about getting weak, about doing stupid things when you're confused and upset. He knew he couldn't hold that against her forever. He never would've let her live with him again, if he hadn't forgiven her already.

What happened, the reason everything got so out of hand, was that he was mad at himself for not getting over it, for not being able to move on and start to live his life again. Rachel's question had fueled that anger, and had put her on the receiving end of his rage. But instead of just blowing up at her, he had done something even meaner. He had used his knowledge about her feelings to deliberately hurt her with a disturbing precision, adding emotional pain to the physical pain she already was in.

He thought back to when his mother was pregnant with his youngest sister. His parents were fighting a lot of the time, and as a kid, he had vowed to himself never to treat the woman who was to carry his child the way his father had treated his mother. Now he'd done the same thing. Maybe he was even going to be the same sort of distant and unfit parent as his father was.

If anything had happened to her or the baby, he would never be able to forgive himself.

"Mr. Tribbiani?"

He was shaken out of his self-reproach by a nurse who was calling into the waiting room.

"Yeah, that's me. I'm Joey Tribbiani."

"Dr. Zimmerman wants to speak with you."

Following the nurse, he tried to calm down enough to be able to talk with the man in a somewhat civilized manner.

"Are you the father of Ms Green's baby?" the man who was apparently Dr. Zimmerman asked him grumpily.

"Yeah, I am. How is she, what's with the baby?"

"The baby is fine. It wasn't in any danger, since the contractions Ms Green had, although intense and painful, weren't effective in terms of starting a premature birth. We gave her something to stop the contractions and a sedative to calm her down."

"Why did that happen?"

"Episodes like this are usually brought on by physically or emotionally traumatic experiences."

Joey felt his stomach drop and his knees go weak. "We... we had an... argument... before..."

"Well, I don't know how heated that was, but normally pregnant women aren't so fragile that they collapse because of an argument. But Ms Green seems to be in some very intense emotional distress. I called her OB-GYN and she told me that Ms Green always seems to be depressed. Lately she's even lost weight. That is a reason to worry. She is a physically healthy young woman, she should be radiant."

"Oh m... "

He was going to say 'Oh my God' but his throat closed in on itself and the guilt he had felt before grew tenfold. It was his fault, he hadn't only been adding to her pain, he had been the one causing it.

"Mr. Tribbiani, I don't know what problems you two have, and frankly I don't want to know. But if you want Ms Green and your child to be okay, you have to start to make that your first priority. If you can't, let someone else take care of her."

………

They had led him to her room and he stepped in there tentatively, suddenly unsure if that was still his place. The question became even more pressing when he stood beside her bed, looking down at her pale face, the white, almost translucent skin, the peaceful expression.

He remembered having looked at her from time to time back when they were together, just reveling in the knowledge that he could walk over to her at any given moment, giving her a kiss, getting one in return. Reveling in the knowledge that he was the one she slept beside at night, that he was the one who could see her writhing with pleasure, who could hear her moaning loudly when she came. That it was his name she called in the throes of passion.

He remembered getting drunk on the feeling that they were together, that she was his.

(Flashback to day 21)

Joey had never been much into jewelry. If he had known before how serious his lack of knowledge was of what was elegant and tasteful, he surely wouldn't have gotten that buddy bracelet for Chandler so many years ago.

So, no, he had no eye for jewelry.

But right now he found himself staring transfixed at a pair of earrings, nicely dangling from a pair of beautiful ears, belonging to an even more beautiful woman.

For the party on the DOOL set, Rachel had chosen to wear colorful earrings, shaped like a pineapple. Of course they went perfectly with her green dress, but he suspected she had a far more clever reason for wearing them, considering what had transpired the night before. And he liked it.

He liked the thought of her trying to put some sort of claim on him, of trying to make him remember that she wasn't about to share. And so he kept looking at her. Besides, there wasn't much else to do and he just plain liked looking at her.

In all her enjoyment of being here, she was a sight to behold. She was smiling and laughing, talking to people and very obviously having a great time. The dress she wore hugged her body perfectly in all the right places. She had her hair put up, but a few tendrils of it curled softly down her neck, which looked so inviting right now, he had half a mind to go over there and sink his teeth into it.

When he shook his head, slightly chuckling at that notion, he noticed something else. He surely wasn't the only guy staring at her. It seemed like every man in the place was staring at her, as if there were countless pairs of eyes greedily devouring her, hungrily roaming over every inch of her body.

Jealousy reared its head with an enraged roar. 'Take your eyes off her, you perverts', he heard himself thinking. 'You have no business looking at her like that. None at all. She's seeing someone. She's taken.' And somehow liking this line of thinking, he finished the thought with grim satisfaction, 'She's mine.'

The repercussions of that sudden insight still begging for further contemplation, he hadn't noticed the man coming up to stand beside him, until he got slapped jovially on his back, almost spilling his drink in the process.

"Hey Joe, what's up, man? Great party, huh?"

After cursorily glancing at Steve, he fixed his eyes on Rachel again.

"Yeah, it's nice," he grumbled, resolving not to let the fact that his mood had been decidedly ruined show too much.

"Damn right," Steve enthused, already starting to wear on Joey's patience. "And a lot of hot chicks here too."

Joey looked around himself, noticing only now that Steve was right. It wasn't like he generally didn't look at other women anymore, it just had somehow slipped his attention, which he found a little weird.

"See the one at the buffet?" Steve continued, rudely pointing his finger at none other than Rachel. "The one with the tight green dress, who's talking to Chris? She has the nicest…"

Fixing Steve with a death glare, he stopped him mid-sentence.

"That's my girlfriend," he growled menacingly, making sure to pronounce the 'my' the way that would make dimwitted Steve understand what he was talking about. It occurred to him that this was the first time he had ever called her that out loud, the first time he openly acknowledged their relationship. And it felt overwhelmingly good, it felt right.

Steve seemed unfazed. "Since when do you have a girlfriend instead of a one night stand?"

Joey didn't answer for a moment because he was distracted when he saw her pausing her conversation, turning to him and smiling and waving a little. He waved back, smiling happily.

"Since her," he finally answered, marveling at how easily she had lifted his mood with a few little gestures.

"Lucky bastard," the man beside him grumbled.

Rachel said something to Chris and then walked over to where Joey and Steve were standing.

"You're right, Joey, Christian Saunders is so gay."

"I'm not," Steve helpfully supplied, winking at Rachel in a way that made Joey want to hit him.

Rachel's mouth curved into a saccharine smile, and to Joey's utter delight she made a show out of clinging to his arm and snuggling as close to him as she could get.

"That's good to know, Stephen, but since the most attractive and definitely not gay man of the DOOL cast is already my boyfriend, I think I'll pass."

Steve rolled his eyes, finally looking as if he had got the message, and started to turn.

"Good lord, as if he needs any more stroking for his ego," they heard him grumble before he disappeared into the crowd.

Rachel tried to pull back, but without even thinking about it he held her in place. She looked up at him with a slightly apologetic smile.

"Sorry, Joe."

"For what?" he asked puzzled.

"For making it official like that."

"I already told him you're my girlfriend," he said quietly, smiling a little.

"You did?" she asked, in a surprised tone that sent a small pang of hurt through him. If there ever was a woman he wanted people to know about…

He put his other arm around her as well and lowered his head so he could whisper into her ear, "Felt great to say it."

"Feels great to hear it," she whispered back equally secretive.

With her mouth so close to his skin, her body snugly pressed against him and his arms around her, desire suddenly jumped at him so forcefully his breath hitched in his chest. Suddenly he found being surrounded by so many people extremely irritating.

As if reading his thoughts, Rachel winked at him.

"So… are there any parts of this set that aren't… crowded like this one? Where a girl could have a bit of private time with her… boyfriend?"

"We could go to my dressing room," he breathlessly suggested, while rapidly failing in an attempt to get himself back under control. He couldn't remember ever feeling so helplessly at the mercy of his own desires, of his own emotions. 'She's mine,' the thought from before still echoed through his brain. 'Mine'. And though it should've been a reassuring thought, for some reason, he needed to prove it to himself. He needed that – needed her - so badly right now, it was all he could do not to act on his impulses right then and there.

Rachel seemed to be blissfully oblivious to his state of mind.

"We can do that later," she smiled. "Why don't you show me where else you work?"

He nodded, not trusting his voice right now, took a deep breath and took a step back from her. With his hand on the small of her back, he gently guided her to the crowed and through a narrow doorway that led to other areas of the soundstage.

Desperately trying to divert his thoughts, he showed her the various rooms they shot scenes in, until they ended up in a mostly undecorated set.

"They use this one for sets you don't see so much," he said, to explain the lack of decoration. "Like the clinic's cafeteria, or the office of Drake's friend. They rebuild those when required."

Rachel nodded and started to walk around the empty room as if there was actually something to look at.

Joey just stared at her, unable to do anything else. The thought got louder and louder in his brain. 'Mine. Of all the guys, she chose me. The perfect woman, she's mine.' He was vaguely disturbed by the cavemanish quality of those thoughts, but he felt unable to stop thinking like that. It was like a rush, something that happened beyond his control.

Rachel turned and watched him for a few seconds and then she leaned against one of the walls and seductively ran her hands down her body.

"Why don't you come over here?" she crooned, and he was seconds away from growling, moments away from abandoning the rest of control left in him an jut pounce on her.

"I'm in a weird place right now," he admitted in a hoarse whisper, hoping it came across as a warning.

She smiled.

"Sounds interesting."

That one cut the cord that had been holding him in place up to that point. He took two large steps and crashed into her, using the weight of his body to press her into the wall behind her, that started to creak suspiciously. A red haze sank over his eyes, and as much as he fought for control over what was happening, he couldn't stop himself from attacking her with bruising kisses, from grabbing the skirt of her dress and pulling it up until it was bunched around her hips. He couldn't help but push himself forcefully between her invitingly spread thighs while tearing her panties off her with an impatient flick of his wrist. After some one handed fumbling with his pants and a condom, he entered her in a single, violent stroke that made Rachel gasp loudly. He felt helpless against the urge to keep assaulting her with a quick succession of powerful thrusts, that – if he had paid attention to such minor details – made the wall behind them shake dangerously.

The loud thunder of his own blood, the sound of his own heartbeat pounding in his ears drowned out every sound around him. He was caught in a limbo of selfishness, of awareness that didn't reach beyond the boundaries of his own body. Nothing else mattered but satisfying an overwhelmingly powerful need, something that felt so raw and primal as if it had come from another,ancient time when self-control wasn't considered a virtue for a man. It urged him to finish what he had started and when he did, his release was so outstandingly intense, it left him drained and shaking.

As he came tumbling down from his orgasmic high, desperately clawing for recollection of what just had happened, he squarely landed right in the middle of the ugly reality of just having brutalized his girlfriend in an embarrassingly needy show of selfishness. Of things having been too fast, too hard and certainly unsatisfying for her. Of having the one woman that meant more to him than anyone else probably being thoroughly disgusted with him right now.

His body refused to comply with his wish to remove himself from her, give her the space she undoubtedly needed. Instead he heavily leaned against her, her legs still snugly wrapped around him. His forehead rested against hers and he listened intently to their labored breaths.

"Well, this certainly was a weird place," Rachel breathlessly whispered against his neck after a while and it almost sounded like there was a soft laugh in her voice. But he wasn't about to trust his senses after what he had done to her.

"I'm… I'm sorry," he rasped, desperation already choking him.

"For what?" Rachel asked, seemingly taken aback by his apology.

"Letting myself go like this…"

Rachel let out a soft giggle. "And there he goes, apologizing for passionate sex."

Just when he was about to explain the difference between passion and what had happened, the set wall behind them groaned in protest and started leaning away from them, putting Joey suddenly off-balance and sending both of them crashing to the ground in a heap of tangled limbs.

While Joey scrambled to help Rachel up again, he was distracted for a moment by an unladylike snort coming from her, that was followed by a fit of hysterical laughter. He wondered for a moment if she had lost her mind, but her merriment was so infectious it tugged at his grim self-flagellation until they were both howling with laughter at the somewhat ridiculous situation.

Still giggling, Rachel finally smoothed down her dress and turned to him, her face glowing with amusement and something that he could swear looked like happiness.

"So… what brought it on?" she asked, wriggling her eyebrows. "The dress… the earrings?"

That put a damper on his mood again and he looked down at his feet.

"Jealousy, I guess," he answered honestly. "All those guys back there, staring at you…"

Rachel sobered up a bit after that and gently caressed his cheek, forcing him to look at her again.

"I only have eyes for you," she whispered in a grave, overly dramaticvoice and then added with a grin, "You're my boyfriend, after all."

It came as a shock to him how deeply those rather carelessly spoken words affected him. While he enveloped her in a tight embrace, burying his face into her neck, words began to form in his mind and to push their way into his awareness. Not those claiming her as his possession, but those giving all his wildly churning emotions a sudden meaning, a purpose – and a name.

"Let's get out of here, Joey," Rachel whispered next to his ear. "Take me home."

(End flashback)

Joey noticed the slight tremble of his fingers when he caressed Rachel's pale cheek.

It felt like that night all over again. The guilt for having done what he did. The disgust with letting himself go like that.

And there was another thing that was exactly like it had been that night. The words that echoed through his thoughts, though they should've been meaningless now. But there was no doubt that, for all that had happened between them; he'd never stopped feeling that way.

He just hoped she would find it in her to forgive him once again.

………

Hearing is the last sense to go when you lose consciousness, and the first to come back. The first thing Rachel heard when she slowly made her way back through the haze was the sound of a heartbeat. Not her own, but the fast thumping sound of her child's heart, coming from the CTG monitor. The sound always made her smile.

Then she felt the somewhat rough hospital pillow against the side of her face, and smelled the disinfected air around her, indicating that she was in a hospital. The memories came crawling back slowly. The memories of the pain, the ride to the hospital, her yelling at the doctor to make it stop, to let her keep her baby as long as it needed to be inside her, his telling her that everything was going to be all right, that the baby wouldn't be born prematurely, if she would only stop panicking.

And she remembered Joey's face, the look of panic and terror that mimicked her own feelings, yet the way he managed to get her into a cab and into a hospital in record time. She hoped he knew everything was going to be okay. Slowly she opened her eyes, expecting blinding brightness, but she was surprised to find the room dimly lit and peacefully quiet.

The first thing she saw was Joey slouching uncomfortably in a chair, sleeping. Obviously being with her had made him getting used to sleeping in chairs. The thought made her smile again, although she began to wonder how long she had been sleeping. It had been morning when the pain began and now it was dark outside and the silence seemed to indicate that it was in the middle of the night.

Joey didn't look as if he was sleeping peacefully. His brows were knitted and his lips tightly pressed together. She remembered looking at him sleeping back when they were together. The peaceful and innocently calm expression on his face while he was sleeping had always calmed her down as well, had always given her a solemn feeling that made it possible for her to fall asleep again. He could slay her demons even in his sleep. Now he had to fight his own, the ones she had awakened.

She remembered what he had said to her before and the sadness that was her constant companion lately took its place by her side once again. But the sharp edge of the heartache she had felt at the words he had said to her was dulled somehow. They had probably given her a sedative or something that took the edge off. But it didn't lessen the ache she felt when she looked at him, nor the general feeling of sadness and hopelessness.

He tried to turn around and almost fell off the chair, waking up in the process.

His first look was at her, and when he saw that she was awake, he rushed to her bed, kneeling down on the floor beside it and took her hand tightly in his.

"Rach, you're awake. I'm so sorry I fell asleep. I wanted to be there when you woke up... "

"S'okay, it's late and I just woke up a few moments ago," she slurred, wondering exactly what kind of drugs they had given her.

He still looked stricken and inexplicably sad. She refused to believe he didn't know everything was okay.

"How are you, baby? How do you feel?"

"I'm okay. They probably gave me something, I feel a bit drunk."

"They gave you a sedative because you were... upset."

When she didn't say something for a while, to her utter confusion a tear started rolling down Joey's cheek, followed by another one. He wasn't even trying to hide them from her, or to wipe them away. She became even more confused, when he pressed his lips fervently against her hand, starting to sob.

"I'm so glad you're okay. So glad. Please forgive me, Rach. I was such an idiot, and I'm so sorry. I can't believe I hurt you both. I wasn't meaning to, I was just stupid. Please forgive me."

His words left her totally flustered. And although him kissing her felt so good it almost made her cry, feeling the warm drops of his tears running over her hand deepened her sadness to an alarming degree.

"What are you talking about?"

He lifted his eyes to her, and seeing them brimming with tears made her heart clench painfully, despite the sedative. She lifted her hand and tried to wipe his tears away. The sadness was momentarily replaced by a sudden happiness when he briefly leaned into her hand, closing his eyes and sighing. But then he turned his head away and looked at her again.

"It's my fault that you're here. The doctor told me. What I said... it upset you so much that those contractions started. I'm making you miserable, Rach, and I didn't even notice. I didn't notice that you were depressed, I didn't know about your weight loss..."

"Who told you that?"

"The doctor here called your OB-GYN and she told him about it."

Rachel could barely imagine what hearing that must have put him through. They made him feel guilty about something that hadn't anything to do with him at all. At least not directly. Before she could say something, Joey continued. "I'm not good for you... or her, on the contrary. You were probably better off with Ross."

Suddenly she was glad they'd given her such a strong sedative because it cushioned that blow at least to a degree where she could deal with it without losing it.

"You... you want me to leave again?"

Now there were tears running down her face too.

Joey pressed his forehead against her hand and said after a few moments, "No, I don't want that. But I... look where you are. I did this to you, Rach."

She lifted her hand to show him she wanted him to look at her.

"Joey, listen to me. This is not your fault. Nothing of this is, regardless of what the doctor said. Yes, I've lost weight. But that was three weeks ago, while I was still living with Ross. Since I've been living with you again, I've gained a few pounds, as I'm sure my doctor will confirm at my appointment with her next week. And... the contractions... those are my fault. I freaked when I walked in on you under the shower, that was when it started. At first I thought it was one of these Braxton thingies again, but they kept getting worse and worse..."

"But why were you freaking out? I mean, you've seen me taking a shower before..."

"I thought you would think I did it on purpose, that I didn't keep to the rules, that you might want me to leave again... Joey, I wouldn't know how to deal with having to leave you again."

He lifted his hand and tenderly touched her face, wiping away the trails her tears had left with his thumb. "Were you worried about that the whole time? That I'd throw you out because of something ridiculous like that?"

"I did something wrong once that made me lose you. When you allowed me to live with you again, I swore to myself that I would never make any mistake again, not even a little one."

"Rach, you can't live with that fear. Especially not if it endangers you or the baby. There is nothing you could do that could make me want to stop living with you. Nothing, I swear."

She closed her eyes at his words, sighing in relief. Joey got up from his kneeling position, groaning a bit, but still left his hand on her face. He leaned forward and pressed a tender and lingering kiss on her forehead.

"Living together again is not something I allowed you to do. And it's not something I decided on a whim either. I thought about it a lot, even before Ross suggested it. I knew I wanted it at least as much as you do. But, obviously, I've changed. What I did, what I said to you... even if it wasn't the reason for what happened, I shouldn't have said it. I shouldn't have felt the need to say it. The real question here is, if you still want to live with someone like me."

"Don't you understand that I'll never want to live with anyone else? And about what you said; you have a right to be angry. I know that, I felt it too. God knows I'm still mad at Ross sometimes when he starts with that 'we were on a break' bullshit. It's nothing you can control."

"I can't run around saying mean things to the woman who's having my baby. That is just lower than low. And I'm not mad at you. Not… anymore."

"I provoked you, I shouldn't have asked such an intimate question. It's none of my business."

"It is, Rachel. We're having a baby together, we should know about each other's lives. I should've just told you that I've dated a few times, but haven't slept with any other woman after you. I was embarrassed and angry at myself and then I took it out on you."

She put her hand above his that was still on her face and smiled at him with an odd mixture of regret and relief. But then her eyelids began to close as if pulled down by a heavy weight.

"Joey I... I'm so tired... I can't..."

He squeezed her hand reassuringly.

"Then go to sleep. I'll be there when you wake up, I promise."

The words were barely out of his mouth when she closed her eyes and the lines on the monitors started to show regular patterns of respiration and heartbeat. He jumped a little when he heard her whisper his name.

"Joe..."

It didn't look like she was awake and he smiled a bit at the memory of her talking in her sleep.

"Joey... I... I love you."

His heart lurched painfully in his chest and for a long time he sat on her bed, lightly caressing her face until he was sure that she was fast asleep. Then he leaned down and – with his face only inches away from hers –whispered a barely audible "I love you too, Rach." Then he closed the space between their lips and brushed a feather light kiss over her lips. "I love you too."

* * *

tbc 


	16. TOW the peanut butter

**TOW the peanut butter**

Rachel stared disgruntled at the colorful picture in the pregnancy book she was reading. 'How to eat for two. Your diet during your pregnancy.' On the picture were tons of fruit and vegetables she was supposed to eat, milk and cheese, eggs and fish. She had never been opposed to eating healthily, on the contrary, but looking at all that healthy food on the picture made her long for a fat-dripping pizza and a big chocolate milk shake.

It were probably these cravings – and the fact that living at Joey's provided her with ample opportunity to eat like that – that had led to her putting on weight again so her OB-GYN was very satisfied. She even felt great, well, at least noticeably better than she had while living at Ross's.

Things seemed to have become easier between her and Joey. They knew how to be around each other again, they kept the tone light and friendly. Neither of them dared to touch the dark subject lingering beyond the shiny surface. Neither of them wanted to risk another incident like the one that had led to her spending two days in the hospital.

She closed the book with a sigh and looked over to Joey, who was fussing around in the kitchen.

"Rach, do you know where that thing is that goes into the top of the blender?"

Shaking her head she replied, "No, haven't seen it."

"Ah, whatever," Joey shrugged, "how important can that be?"

Her eyes went wide, while in her head she already saw the contents of the blender flying around the whole apartment.

"STOP, Joey!"

He looked up at her quizzically. "What?"

"Trust me, it's very important," she said while getting up from the couch and walking over to him to help him look. When she stood next to him and peeked into the blender, she couldn't help being enticed by the smell that emanated from whatever he had in there. "Mhhm, what is that? It smells delicious."

"It's going to be a peanut butter smoothie, but not until I found that … ah, here it is."

He held up the item in question victoriously and then put in where it belonged.

"Can I have some?" she asked.

Joey chuckled. "Rach, not that I don't want to give you some, but you know you hate peanut butter."

"I… know but right now… peanut butter sounds really good all of a sudden."

Joey's smile widened. "Let's try something."

He took a spoon, took some peanut butter out of the jar and handed the spoon to Rachel. She hesitated a bit before putting it into her mouth, remembering how she always hated the fat, sticky texture of it, but it was like it called out to her. She tasted it carefully but then the rich flavor exploded in her mouth and her eyes almost rolled back into her head with appreciation.

"Mmhhhm… that tastes so great… can I have some more?" she asked eagerly and Joey grinned even more broadly.

"What is so funny?"

"Nothing," he smiled, "only that my daughter is making you eat peanut butter."

While she savored the feeling of another spoonful of peanut butter dissolving in her mouth, a question she had meant to ask him a long time ago popped into her brain again.

"How did you know it was a girl anyway?"

Joey grinned mischievously. "I knew what I made."

She couldn't resist rolling her eyes at that. "Joe…"

"I had a feeling," he admitted, looking down at his hands as if that was something embarrassing. "And I… I sort of wished it would be a girl."

She gaped at him for a while before she found her voice again, "But you said it from the minute you'd known I was pregnant."

With a sad smile he looked up at her and asked, "Remember when we talked about you fantasizing about having kids with me someday?"

"Yeah."

"I had my dreams, too."

She knew that he wasn't saying that to make her feel guilty. But she did. The guilt was always with her, hanging around her neck like a stone, but in moments like these it was worse. It made her wonder if she would ever be free of that, if she would ever have the feeling of having paid her dues.

"And I've destroyed them," she whispered and turned around, heading for her room.

She sat down on her bed heavily and tried not to give in to the urge to cry.

A minute later she saw him leaning in the doorframe, a glass of peanut butter smoothie in his hand like a peace offering. When she didn't say anything, he came in, sat down beside her and put his hand on her belly.

"Not all of them," he offered with a cautious smile.

The moment she forced herself to smile at him as well, the baby started moving around, bumping against Joey's hand.

"Hi sweetie," he cooed at her belly, putting the glass on the nightstand to have his other hand free as well, "it's me, your daddy."

"I think she knows it's you, Joey," Rachel observed solemnly, putting her hand above his. "She wakes up every time you have your hand on my belly. She… she loves you."

Her last words sounded hoarse and were laced with unshed tears. She would've loved to tell him that it wasn't just his daughter who loved him, but she didn't dare to, because he had been so adamant about her living with him again should be nothing romantic.

Joey was silent for a few moments, concentrating on the movement beneath his hands. Then he looked up at Rachel.

"I love her, too."

She took a shuddering breath, still fighting back tears.

To break the uncomfortable silence, Joey took the glass again and handed it to her. "Here, you have to drink that as long as it's fresh. I put some fruit in there as well, so now it doesn't only taste good, it's healthy, too."

She brought the glass to her lips and tasted the weird looking beverage. "Mhmm, that's so good."

After drinking the whole glass at once, she smiled at him genuinely. "Just keep those around and you won't have to worry about me losing any more weight. And I won't make you get up at three in the morning to bring me ice cream."

He chuckled at that and almost seemed relieved that the mood had lightened again. "And what do I do with all the ice cream I've already hoarded in the freezer? And what about the pickles?"

She made a face. "Ew Joey, if you don't want me to throw up, don't mention those again."

"Anything else that makes you sick?"

"Tuna, the smell of beer… and lobster."

"Okay, so I guess we'll stick to peanut butter."

"Yup," she confirmed and noticed that his brows knitted when he looked at her. She inclined her head questioningly and Joey tried to point out something on her face.

"Uhm Rach, you have… there above your lip,"

Apparently she hadn't gotten all of the remnants of peanut butter smoothie off her face when she had wiped her mouth before. Her attempts to get clean seemed to be somewhat unsuccessful because Joey still tried to indicate she missed a spot.

Just when she was about to go to the bathroom and wash her face, he lifted his hand and touched her, obviously trying to help. But feeling his hand gingerly touching her face made her go completely still, trying not to do anything that might scare him. But suddenly, he was the one doing something scary.

He leaned in and kissed her. On her mouth.

There were a lot of things she wished she could have back. A whole, endlessly long list of things she missed so terribly that she sometimes could barely breathe thinking about them. Him kissing her so heartbreakingly gently and lovingly was without any doubt somewhere near the top of that list. She knew it wouldn't last, she knew it was just a fleeting moment of weakness on his part, but she was determined to savor every last second of it, to remember every detail, every feeling. Kissing him back was something she didn't even consider. He was giving her something precious and she was not about to belittle that by demanding more.

A single tear rolled down her face at the thought that she could have had that in abundance for the rest of her life, if it hadn't been for her own careless foolishness. The tear made its way to where his lips were touching hers. He probably tasted the salty liquid and pulled back, looking at her startled.

"I'm sorry, Rach. I'm…"

She frantically shook her head at his misinterpretation of her tears and hurriedly tried to wipe them away. "You have nothing to be sorry for, Joey. Nothing."

"I really don't?"

Sensing that he was talking about more than just the kiss, she asked, "What do you mean?"

"I sometimes wonder if there's something I said, or should've said. Something I did wrong or didn't do or …"

She cut him off hurriedly, wanting him to not even think about such a possibility.

"I can't believe you think that, Joe. It was not your fault. You did nothing wrong. It was all me, it's all my fault, everything's my fault."

"But…" he objected weakly, but she interrupted him again.

"No, not but. I managed to screw up the best thing that ever happened to me and I did it all by myself."

Joey shook his head and looked down onto his lap. "My mother always said it takes two people to break up a relationship."

"Yeah, the one who is cheating and the one who then breaks up with the cheater."

His soft demeanor suddenly changed and he looked up at her again determinedly and almost a bit angry. "You have to stop doing that, Rach."

"Doing what?"

"Carrying around that guilt like some sort of… a punishment. That can't be good for you and it's certainly not good for the baby. We've already established that one."

She sighed. It was clear that the shaky truce they had wouldn't last forever. A conversation like this one was bound to happen sooner or later, so she might as well get it over with now. Maybe it was about time she told him how she felt about that.

"But it's what I feel. I feel guilty. I _am_ guilty. You know, back when I broke up with Ross, I wanted him to take responsibility for what he did, I wanted him to acknowledge that our breakup was his fault. He never did, so I never gave him another chance."

A deep frown appeared on Joey's face while his gaze drilled into her. "So you think you taking all the blame for what happened will make me give you another chance?"

She gasped at the implication that she hadn't even been aware of, and shook her head frantically. "No, I… I… no Joey. That sounds like I've been wanting to manipulate you. I haven't. But I want you to know that I'm aware that it was my fault, that I'm not blaming anyone but myself."

He was silent for a few moments after she'd said that and she looked at him intently, trying to make him understand that this was really how she felt.

Joey took a deep breath. "Rach, I don't want you to take all the blame, because it wasn't only your fault. What happened takes at least one extra person to do, so don't you tell me you did it all by yourself. I don't want to see you feeling miserable and guilty all the time, I want to understand what had happened and why. And I'm not gonna understand that if you keep telling me you did it alone."

"I didn't do it alone, but you have to believe me that it had nothing to do with anything about you. Nothing _at all_."

He shook his head, almost like a petulant child, his mouth set into a grim line. "I seriously don't believe that, Rachel. Because you left _me_, you couldn't stand to be in one apartment with _me_, there had to be a reason and it is not too out there to think that this reason was - in fact - me."

"Joey, you know that I sometimes need time alone to think. I did it before, remember?" she said softly, pleadingly. She had to make him understand that he was not to blame for any of this.

"But even before, it had something to do with me," he kept insisting.

"No, it didn't," she objected firmly.

He shook his head again. "It had to do with me pushing you up against that wall over there. I was the reason for your need to think. So what did I do that made you leave this apartment that night?"

She sighed defeated. "You got me pregnant. And I'm not saying it was a bad thing, just like you pushing me up against the wall wasn't. But the thing is, back then, thinking about it hadn't gotten me anywhere. I was only realizing what to feel about it when I came back to you, when I talked to you. The night when I knew I was pregnant, I went to the wrong man. I made the mistake of not coming back to you, talking to you. Who do you think I can blame for that?"

"Maybe I shouldn't have let you go then?" he asked tentatively.

"Do you think I would've let you keep me here against my will?"

"No, probably not. But maybe I could've said something that would've made you stay?"

"You told me you loved me, you told me that nothing could change that. What more could I have wished to hear from a man who had just learned that he was gonna be a father?"

"I still think I saw something in your eyes that night. When you turned to leave, it looked like you were… disappointed."

Rachel swallowed hard. How could he have seen that? It was such a short moment and she had turned around a second later.

Joey came closer to her, staring intently into her eyes. "Rach, what are you not telling me?"

She closed her eyes for a second before she found the courage to tell him. "In that moment… what you saw… it was because you said that you didn't want me to think about not keeping her. It hurt me to know that you thought me capable of doing that. I thought you knew I loved you, that I wanted to have a future with you. It felt like you had no faith in me."

When he didn't say anything for the longest time, she continued, "As it turned out, you were right about doubting me."

"No, I wasn't right," he said sadly. "I shouldn't have said that. I should've told you how much I wanted to have her. How happy it made me that we were having a baby. Instead I was probably the first one to make you think of yourself as a bad mother."

Now it was her who was seeking his gaze, trying to make him understand. "It still doesn't make any of this your fault in any way."

"You were vulnerable, you didn't know what to feel and I wasn't helping."

"You were probably even more confused than I was. No one could've expected you to be all level-headed and calm in a situation like that."

"I still shouldn't have said it."

She didn't quite know what to say to that. In a way, he was right. It had hurt her and maybe if she had been surer about his faith in her, she wouldn't have felt the wish to turn back time. Using the opportunity that presented itself she asked, "Why did you?"

"There were so many things flying through my head, and that was one of them. And thinking that there was a possibility to lose her, to suddenly not have her in our life, was unbearable."

"It had nothing to do with… you know… your upbringing, being Catholic and everything?"

"No, that didn't even cross my mind back then. It was only that the thought of having a child with you felt so great, I didn't want to have it any other way."

She nodded, lost in memories. "I think I know what you mean. When I went to my doctor the day… after we broke up, she told me that home pregnancy tests aren't always accurate and there might be the possibility that I wasn't even pregnant. I'll never forget the feeling of thinking that there might be no baby."

"But then you should've been happy when you found out. But I've never seen you as confused as you were that day."

Revisiting the emotions she had been going through that day, thinking about how confused she had been, was painful, but she knew he deserved to know, he needed to know, so she took a deep calming breath and started to talk. "When I was holding that test in my hand and saw the two lines, I had the biggest smile on my face. I was happy, Joe. But the more I thought about it, the more doubts I had, the more questions. So I threw the test in Mon's trash, because I wanted to tell you after we told everyone else about us being together. I so wanted to make it official, to do it right. It still grates on me that we didn't have the chance to do that. I was so upset about it, that all the doubts I already had went crazy inside my head. Suddenly I was afraid of what you would say, if you'd think I did it intentionally, to get you to marry me or something. There was this beautiful fantasy I had about how it would be with us being together, and suddenly nothing was like it should've been. I didn't know what to do, how to deal with it."

His gaze softened after she said that and she couldn't see a trace of reproach or anger in his eyes. It really looked like he understood.

"I guess me telling you we should get married wasn't exactly helping either."

He understood, and that thought alone made her smile for a split second. But she got serious again in an instant to answer his question. "No, it wasn't. It was what I had been afraid of. That you would marry me because I was pregnant, not because you love me."

Now the understanding on his face gave way to shocked horror. "Rach! You knew how much I love you. How could you have thought that?"

"Joey, what we had was… exceptional. But in the end, it was only seven weeks. For a relationship that is pretty much nothing. It is definitely not enough to know if you want to spend the rest of your life together, if you really work as a couple. I mean… I was convinced we would, but I would've loved to find that out without carrying your baby already. It made a 'we have to' out of a 'we want to'."

"I wish I could've seen what was going on in your head that day. It hurts to think that I confused you even more. Because knowing you were pregnant didn't change a thing about what I felt for you. Or about how much I wanted us to have a future together. It still hurts me more than I can ever say that we missed that chance. Because I wanted it so badly."

"I… I still want that future, Joe. I know you said it's over, but I never stopped wanting that."

He froze after those words had left her mouth and she looked at him searchingly. She saw a plethora of conflicting emotions lingering beneath the calm and controlled surface, she saw the things he wanted to say, the questions he needed to ask.

In a way, she dreaded having to answer those, but when he averted his eyes, cleared his throat uncomfortably and got up, her disappointment told her that she wanted him to say what was on his mind, that she needed to honestly answer his questions, that she was ready to. But she lacked the eloquence and the right words to make him stay, to get him to open up to her, so she watched helplessly as he headed out of her room.

To her surprise, he paused in the doorway, stood there for a few moments with his back still to her and then turned around. A barely visible, almost shy smile was on his face when he said, "We've never… celebrated that we're having a baby. What about… me taking you out to dinner tomorrow?"

"I'd love that," she whispered, a happy smile lighting up her face.

………

That night, when she made her way back to her room from her nightly visit to the bathroom, Joey's voice made her jump a little.

"The little one bothering you again?"

"Well, she sure doesn't let me sleep through the night."

Joey made a sympathetic face, but she waved it off and said lightly, "Just as well – I have to get used to it anyway."

She sat beside him on the lounger and he put both of his hands on her belly, as always prompting the baby to move around inside her.

"Hi sweetie," Joey cooed, making her melt. She could so see him being this wonderful, doting father.

"Mommy and I gotta think about a name for you," he said and looked at her expectantly.

It wasn't like she hadn't given the matter any thought, but she had thought he would have a few suggestions first. So she went with what she thought he wanted. "What about Gloria?" she asked.

Joey shook his head decisively. "Don't know about that. Might be weird."

That surprised her a bit so she asked, "Why?"

"I don't want to think of my mother every time I say the name of my daughter."

Rachel nodded, thinking about how it might feel for her if she called her daughter Sandra. She had to admit that Joey had a point. "Makes sense. So, any suggestions?"

Joey had never been good at pretending, so when he suggested naming the baby Phoebe or Monica she knew exactly that this wasn't what he really wanted.

She shook her head, dismissing his idea, and had the distinct feeling he was glad about that.

"What about Kate?" she asked then, knowing which territory they'd steer into with that.

"Ah… no. Ex-girlfriend."

She gave a short laugh, once because he was so honest about that and second because it confronted them with a bit of a problem.

"Joey, if we're ruling out the names of all your ex-girlfriends, we're gonna run out of names pretty quickly."

Joey didn't seem to share that concern. "We just need to steer clear of Kate, Andrea… and Melanie. Oh and Janine. Kathy, Ursula… that's about it. Oh and Angela. And…" he trailed off, looked at her, and began grinning when he saw her raised eyebrows. "And… I kinda start to see your point."

They smiled at each other for a while and she felt tingling warmth coursing through her blood. But she caught herself in time and cleared her throat awkwardly and decided to just come out and say what she'd been thinking about - name wise.

"Julia sounds kinda nice."

Joey looked away and thought about it for a while. Then he said, "Yeah… it does." And almost as if saying it to himself he added, "Julia Green."

"Julia Tribbiani," she corrected him hastily.

He looked at her seriously and not for the first time she wished she could read his thoughts. "You sure?" he finally asked.

Rachel heaved an inward sigh of relief. "Joey, you're her father."

He smiled a little and looked down at her belly. "Yeah… yeah, I am her father." Then he gingerly put his hand on her belly again and asked, "Were you ever wondering when it happened? Could your doctor tell you the date?"

"She told me a possible date, but it was somewhere in the first week and… well there were a lot of possibilities."

Joey smiled wistfully. "Yeah, the first weeks…"

"Well if a condom doesn't work in three out of hundred times, this means it doesn't work in one time out of thirty three and I guess we kinda arrived at that number fairly soon," she said, trying to lighten the mood a bit. For once, she didn't feel sad and she wanted it to stay that way, at least for tonight.

"We always had a great time together, didn't we?" Joey mused, still with this faraway look in his eyes.

"Never had a better time with anyone," she admitted.

"Then why…?" he started but stopped when he saw her pleading look. It wasn't like she didn't want to answer that question, this one, and any other question he had. But they had just made such an important decision about the future, she didn't want to taint that with painful memories from the past.

But Joey apparently wasn't quite ready to let it go.

"I just… you know, those first weeks were amazing. But I… I liked the last two better. The ones where we knew that we were in love. When we wanted to tell everyone, when we felt as if nothing could ever come between us. If I could have that feeling back, if I could ever be so sure of you again, so sure of us… "

She knew what he meant. She knew the feeling, the doubts. What she didn't know was how to get back to that feeling of security and trust Joey had referred to. But she knew she had to at least try.

"Do you remember what I said after we… dropped out of the friend zone?" she asked haltingly.

"That you felt something?" was Joey's equally careful answer.

She took a deep breath and looked him straight in the eyes. "That I felt we could be a perfect fit," she said in a firm voice. "And we were. Or at least that's what I always felt… it's what I still feel, that you're truly my other half. You're the man who completes me. There will never, ever, be anyone else."

He hastily looked away from her after she'd said that. "How can you say that? Maybe…"

She interrupted him, suddenly very anxious to make him understand. "Joey, if I learned one thing out of this horrible thing I did, it was that nothing and no one could ever make me as happy as you did. You're the One. The only one."

It was God's honest truth, but when she saw him still avoiding looking at her, slightly shaking his head in refusal to believe her, she knew she had failed yet again to convince him of her sincerity. Not that it surprised her much.

While she fought back tears, he began to speak in a low, barely audible voice. "I… I want to believe that so badly. I mean, really believe it… here," he said, putting his hand above his heart. "But I don't think I can. Not anymore."

She wiped her eyes and nodded bravely. "I know," she said, trying to keep the tears out of her voice, "I didn't expect you to. I just wanted you to know."

After having said that she stood up and went to her room. As she stood in the doorway she turned around again. "I like to think it was the first night," she said quietly, lightly smiling, "That she was meant to be."

He smiled back a bit and nodded, "Yeah, I think that too."

* * *

tbc 


	17. TOW the memories

**TOW the memories **

'Be ready at seven. I'll pick you up. J.'

She'd found that note with the few sparse words on the kitchen counter in the morning and ever since that moment she found herself in a state between cautious expectation excitement and the less and less successful attempt at not getting her hopes up.

After standing in front of the mirror for hours, trying to decide what to wear, she finally settled for a very simple black dress that didn't draw too much attention to her body. Because although Joey had said they wanted to celebrate them becoming parents, she didn't want this evening to be about the pregnancy or the baby. She wanted it to be about them.

………

He had picked her up at seven, with a lovely bouquet of lilies in his hand and an open smile that promised a relaxed and angst free evening. It wasn't too far fetched to think that he didn't like the occasional tension between them any more than she did.

On the way to the restaurant they had a light conversation about something Chandler had said the other day and about some of Phoebe's antics from the day before. It started a delightfully funny reminiscing about all the hilarious things that had happened since the six of them had become friends and before she knew it, they sat at their table in the restaurant, laughing and talking, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Well, then," Joey said raising his glass of water, "To the seventh member of the group."

She raised her own glass and clinked it to his, a little stunned at the realization that Joey still counted them as being six, which meant somewhere deep down, he still included Ross. She managed to mask her surprise with a smile, but it didn't take Joey long to pick up on the subtle shift in the mood. He surprised her even more with what he said next. And though he struggled with words and obviously fought to bring across what he felt, it sounded like he had given that matter a lot of thought.

"I've never thought that he… Ross… doesn't belong with everyone anymore. I mean… yes, I'm mad at him and I can't see myself forgiving him, but … it always feels like as angry as I am at him, I can't just… leave him behind and move on. I have to deal with my anger at him someday, because… it's like, we're bound together somehow. Like we're not just a bunch of friends. We're…. we're family."

Rachel nodded and, on an impulse, reached across the table and took his hand, squeezing it reassuringly. She felt too choked up to say anything, but she hoped he could see how much it meant to her that he felt that way. Not for Ross's sake, but for Joey's.

Joey put his other hand over hers and they sat like this for a while, just looking at each other, getting lost in each other's eyes. They were interrupted by a waiter who came breathlessly to their table.

"Sorry about the wait, but it is mega-jammed in here! We have a couple specials tonight…"

He began rattling off a list of specials that Rachel had a hard time focusing on because she was becoming distracted by Joey's thumb drawing circles on the back of her hand. A sudden silence indicated that the waiter was done and Joey abruptly let go off her hand and ordered, thankfully for both of them because eating was about the farthest thing from her mind right now. Rachel drew her hand back belatedly, hiding it in her lap and wondering if the spot he had touched would eventually stop tingling.

"I always wondered why the others never found out about us," Joey said into the ensuing silence, looking at her warmly. "We weren't trying _that_ hard to keep it a secret."

It was an innocent enough question, but to her, it had so much more meaning. That he talked about Ross voluntarily, that he touched her, caressed her without flinching away, that he brought up the past – it was like he had set his mind to finally closing the gap between them.

And she surely wasn't going to stop him.

"Remember the one time when we were in the coffee house talking, and then suddenly Phoebe was there?" she asked and Joey nodded, his eyes sparkling with amusement.

It had been three days after their first night. They'd spent every minute of their free time in bed together, talking, eating take-out and of course, having lots of sex. That day they thought they would be able to make it out of bed for long enough to brush up on their social life and go to the coffee house to have some quality time with their friends.

But when they'd walked into Central Perk no one was there. Since they already had made the effort, they'd decided to stay for a while and wait for the others. It was then that Joey had brought up the fact that they hadn't even been on a real date yet, and they'd talked about doing that. She'd asked him what he had in mind and while he was telling her, he had put his hand on her thigh, gently caressing her leg with his thumb.

It wasn't a conscious effort to seduce or arouse, it was a careless gesture of intimacy and affection. She'd barely noticed it. Especially since he was painting an enthralling picture of a candlelight dinner, a bottle of champagne, dancing and a carriage ride through the park. He left the specifics of what would come after that to her imagination and, sure enough, her imagination filled in the blanks pretty nicely.

Then she had become gradually aware of someone saying their names. Repeatedly. Turning their heads at the same time, they'd noticed Phoebe, who looked slightly pissed. They'd tried to hide their embarrassment by greeting her overly excited until they'd noticed that Phoebe kept staring at Rachel's lap. Turned out Joey's hand had wandered up a bit during their conversation and had vanished under her skirt. The way he'd drawn his hand away hastily had probably done nothing against the impression that there was something unusual going on. But Phoebe had just grinned knowingly and changed the topic.

"He, yeah. Why didn't she pick up on that?" Joey wondered aloud.

"I actually asked her that a while ago. She said that the possibility of us being together never crossed her mind. She was thinking you were trying to feel me up or something … 'Joey-like', you know."

Joey nodded, digesting the thought. "I guess the possibility of me doing something 'Joey-like' really seemed to have kept them from ever finding out."

His faraway, dreamy expression indicated that he was thinking of a special occasion.

"What are you thinking?" she asked which made him turn his gaze to her again.

"Movie night, remember?"

Of course Rachel remembered.

(Flashback day 37)

They were in bed together – like most of the time back then – satiated and a bit exhausted. Rachel lay on her stomach and was on the verge of falling asleep, and Joey lay on his side and drew lazypatterns on her back with his fingers, enjoying the feeling of her soft skin beneath his fingertips.

"Thirty seven," she murmured sleepily, "you just drew a thirty seven."

"Today we've been together for thirty seven days," he explained in a husky whisper and it sounded meaningful somehow.

"Anything special about that number?"

"No, just the longest relationship I've ever been in. It's… it's a first."

His voice was still thick with emotions and she turned to look at him. His expression was serious, almost dark in its intensity. He looked as if he was about to say something important, something she didn't quite know she was ready to hear, yet.

"What about Angela Delvechio?" she tried to remind him of his own past. "I thought you had been going out for three years?"

"Well, not only with one another, so I guess that doesn't count," he replied with a non-committal shrug and though he still looked serious, she could tell that the moment had come – and gone.

"So I'm special, huh?" she joked tiredly.

Joey's answer came with a wide smile. "I think I've already told you that a few times."

"I don't mind you saying it more than once," she whispered and closed her eyes, while Joey inched closer to her.

"I could show you…" he breathed against her skin before placing feather light kisses on her shoulder. It was one of those moments when she actually regretted being tired. She was constantly tired lately and she had decided she would go to bed early tonight. Although going to bed had never been the problem – actually going to sleep had been. Like now.

"Sounds great, but I'm really tired, Joe."

"I know, baby," he said with a sigh and pulled her into his arms so she could comfortably nestle her head against his chest. "I'll let you sleep."

"Joey," Rachel yawned a few minutes later, "do you ever get the feeling that you're forgetting something important? Something you will be kicking yourself for once you remember it again?"

"No, baby, because I write all the really important stuff on my hand if I really need to remember something."

At that moment, both of them looked at the inside of his right hand.

'Movie at M – bring p+b' was standing there in barely readable, smudged letters.

"Oh shit," they exclaimed in unison, jumping out of bed and trying to sort out their clothes that lay in one heap on the floor.

"When were we supposed to be there?"

Joey looked at his hand, straining his eyes to decipher the rest of his note. "I know I wrote it down, but I guess now we have to look somewhere on your body to find it again."

Rachel stopped what she was doing and stood up, grinning at him. "Wanna look?"

When he looked up from his hand to her, she realized he hadn't really meant it seriously, which made his expression all the more priceless.

"Well, couldn't hurt to try, could it?" he grinned back and stepped closer to her, beginning to examine every square inch of her body closely, placing and odd kiss here and there, making her forget what he was looking for in the first place.

"I found nothing," he stated after a while, gazing at her lovingly, "but boy, am I glad I looked."

"I think she said nine," Rachel informed him after kissing him.

Joey looked at the clock, groaning. "Man, we're about ten minutes too late already and we have neither p nor b."

"Huh?"

"Popcorn and beer."

"Okay Joe, here's the plan. We can't show up too late together at Mon's anyway, that would be far too obvious. So I'm getting the popcorn, you're getting the beer and we come back separately, excusing ourselves with having had to work late."

"What if they called you at work and know you left early?"

"Why would they? They didn't even call here."

"They probably did. Didn't you hear the phone ring half an hour ago?"

"No, I was… uhm… sort of… concentrating on something else. But maybe they left a message."

Turned out they had. Chandler had called, telling them they didn't need to bring anything but themselves.

"Good to know. Are we still going over there separately?"

"Who cares, sooner or later we're going to tell them anyway, so why bother?"

Joey suddenly looked oddly excited. "We're going to tell them?"

She couldn't figure out why this seemed to be such a revelation to him, but just in case, she explained.

"Yes, Joey, remember, we talked about that before. If we think the time is right, we'll tell them, if they find out themselves, we're not going to deny it, right? That was the deal."

Joey nodded along but then asked, "I mean, tonight?"

She sighed, finally understanding his outburst and feeling bad about having to wet-blanked his enthusiasm.

"No, not tonight," she said softly. "I don't think it would be the right time."

Joey nodded confirming but kept his eyes on the floor, making her feel even worse. And if she was honest, lately she didn't feel much like having to hide their relationship either.

"Although if we did tell them," she mused aloud, "I could sit on your lap the whole evening through whatever awful movie Chandler has picked."

"I'd like that a lot," Joey beamed at her.

"You know… I think we should do that anyway, maybe they won't even notice."

After kissing for a few more minutes, they went over to Monica's where the others were already engrossed in the movie and didn't pay much attention to their excuses or the fact that Rachel sat on Joey's lap, that she snuggled up to him very closely and that he had his arms around her the whole evening.

(End flashback)

Rachel smiled fondly at that memory.

"Yeah, that was a great night. I had been so sure I would fall asleep halfway through the movie but... well, it was a great movie.I think it was during that movie that I realized I was falling in love with you."

A wistful smile played around Joey's lips. "I knew that before, but when that song came up… you know 'Come what may'… when you took my hand and held onto it for the rest of the movie, I knew I wanted to tell you, and I had a feeling that there might be a chance you felt the same way. I really had to fight the urge to just kiss you right there."

She met his gaze and the way he looked at her had her feeling as if nothing had happened, nothing had changed… as if he still felt that way. But soon enough he averted his eyes and busied himself with his food again. "But I guess that really would've given it away."

Rachel looked back at her plate too, feeling a twinge of disappointment.

"The moment I really thought that the truth was out was that day I had forgotten to lock the door and Chandler walked in," she said after a while in a desperate attempt at keeping the conversation going.

Joey laughed out loud at that memory and the tension was broken. "Yeah… I mean it seems funny now, but back then I really thought I was gonna die of embarrassment."

(Flashback to day 28)

That day Rachel had come home from work fuming with anger. She had slammed the door shut behind her, not bothering to lock it like in the four weeks before. On the way to her room she noticed Joey sitting on the Barcalounger and muttered an unenthusiastic "Hi" in his general direction.

Her purse landed on her bed and she just stood there for a while, trying to calm down enough to be able to have a decent conversation with her boyfriend. Who unfortunately stood right in her door, looking at her smiling. "Hi beautiful."

The cheerfulness in his voice, the way he smiled at her happily, unnerved her all of a sudden. She needed time to cool off, to think about what happened at work today and she needed to do that alone.

"Joey, don't take this the wrong way but I need to shower, I need to change and I need to be alone for a while."

His smile faltered and he took a step back. "Okay Rach. I… I'm gonna be in my room if you need… to talk or something."

He turned around on his heel and headed for his room, not looking back. She heaved a sigh of relief and made her way to the bathroom. After she had taken a shower, cleaned her face and brushed her hair, she felt slightly better. And she began to feel guilty for the way she had treated Joey. On the other hand she dreaded having to apologize for her behavior.

In a similar situation, it would have taken her hours to convince Ross that she wasn't trying to hurt his feelings and that she still wanted to spend time with him and so on. The thought alone exhausted her to such a degree that she contemplated not doing it at all. Back in her room, she sorted a bit through the papers she had brought from work and felt the anger at what happened rising again, so she stuffed them back into her purse and sat down on her bed, staring at the wall.

The feeling of misery and loneliness soon outweighed her reluctance to apologize. She determined that the one thing she really needed right now was crawling into a pair of welcoming, strong arms where she could feel safe and protected, where nothing else mattered but being with him. She knocked at his door, suddenly unsure if he would want her to just come barging in. When he shouted "It's open," she opened the door and stepped in.

Joey looked up from the script he was reading and smiled at her, not a trace of anger or reproach on his face.

"Look Joe, I'm sorry," Rachel began without even taking a step into his direction.

He motioned for her to sit on his bed and looked at her seriously.

"Rach, you've got nothing to be sorry for. You wanted to be left alone. I can understand that."

"So you're not mad at me?"

"Of course I'm not. Us being together doesn't mean we have to spend every free minute with one another. We're both used to having time for ourselves, that doesn't need to change."

"But you don't seem to need to be alone."

"I'm here a lot more than you are, I have my time alone. You never have. From now on, I'll leave you alone when you come home and we… talk whenever you feel up to it. Deal?"

"I don't want you to leave me alone, Joe," she said, wrapping her arms around him. "Ever. I always look forward to coming home to you, to kissing you hello, to talking about my day. I don't know what is up with me today. I haven't had such a shitty day in a very long time."

"Wanna tell me what happened?"

She told him about everything that went wrong that day. How she had barely made it out of bed because she had been feeling a little dizzy in the morning lately. How she didn't get a cab until it was almost too late, how she spilled coffee on her white blouse, and how all her suggestions fell flat in the meeting she had that day.

"Wow, your day really sucked. Anything I can do to make you feel better?"

"Hmm, I guess I can think of a thing or two," she smiled at him.

When he started kissing her, when he started to touch her in that special way of his that always made her go weak, she whispered into his ear, "I have a feeling my day has just gotten a lot better."

It hadn't taken them long to arrive at the point where Joey blindly groped around on his nightstand for a condom. Only this time, his hand came back empty.

"Shit," he cursed under his breath, "I can't believe I'm out of condoms."

Although she was as frustrated as he was, she still managed to remember that she'd seen a box in the bathroom. "Wait, Joe, I know where we still have some, I'll go get them."

She was almost out the door when he stopped her. "Don't go naked, people can see you through the windows."

As she grabbed the nearest piece of clothing she could find – one of his shirts that went almost down to her knees – she grinned at him. "Maybe they'll like what they'll see."

"They definitely will, but I don't want them to look at…"

He swallowed hard and stopped mid sentence. Curiosity at what exactly he had intended to say made her step into his direction again.

"Look at what?"

"Weren't you going to get something?" he tried to divert her attention.

This was interesting. If had meant to say something dirty, he just would've said it. But if he wasso reluctant, it had to be good. "Look at what, Joey?"

He bit his lip and looked down at his hands. Rachel sat down onto the bed again, brought her hand to his chin and lifted his head up again to make him look at her.

"Look at what?"

The expression on his face, the look in his eyes startled her with its intensity.

"Look at what's mine," he finally admitted in a husky growl that made her shiver.

Somewhere in the back of her mind the independent and emancipated woman she was shrieked in horror at what he'd just said. But her heart… her heart took it as what it was, a completely honest declaration of what he felt for her.

"So I'm yours, hmm?" she whispered while leaning in to kiss him.

"Does that make you mad?" he whispered back, closing his eyes.

"No, it doesn't. It's… nice. So, are you mine too?"

"Do you want me to be?"

"I do, Joey. I do."

With that she closed the space between their lips and they kissed again, hungrily and passionately, until the problem from before came up again.

"All right, I was going to get something," she panted and then headed for the bathroom, still wearing Joey's shirt.

She was just about to go back to him, when the apartment door opened and Chandler suddenly stood in the kitchen, looking at her weirdly.

"Hi Rach, I was looking for Joey."

"Uhm…" she stammered, totally embarrassed by the way she was – or better wasn't – dressed and tried to hide the box of condoms behind her back.

"He… is in his room. I… I think he's kinda busy, though."

"Joey, wanna play some foosball, buddy?" Chandler had shouted into the direction of Joey's room while Rachel checked if Joey's shirt covered at least all the important parts of her body.

About twenty seconds later Joey emerged from his room, shirtless and just closing the last button of his pants. His face was beet red and there was no mistaking where the bulge in his jeans was coming from.

"Uhm… Chan… I'm kinda… in the middle of something," he said, looking nervously back and forth between her and Chandler.

There seemed to be no way Chandler wouldn't figure out what was going on. Half naked Joey plus half naked Rachel equals …

"Oh… oh, I'm so sorry buddy. I didn't know you had a girl over, it seems it bit early in the evening for that but… whatever… go back in there and… have fun and… Rachel, you might want to wear something more appropriate when Joey's date comes out of that room or she might get jealous. So… uhm… see you guys later."

And with that seemingly unstoppable stream of words he was out the door, leaving the two of them baffled.

(End flashback)

Joey couldn't even manage to take a sip of his wine because he was still snickering. "He always thinks he is so smart, and he totally couldn't put one and one together."

"I wonder what he would've thought, if I really had been naked."

"In that case, he would've just stopped thinking altogether."

"Funny thing is, me getting condoms was kinda pointless already back then."

"Imagine if you hadn't gone to get them, he might have walked in on us doing it."

"You think that this would've made him think that something was going on between us?"

They both started laughing so hard they drew a bit of attention to them from the other tables.

Rachel calmed down first. "They never really considered us a possibility, did they? All of them."

"Yeah, they didn't. And if you really think about it, we were only a few weeks ahead of them in thinking it might be possible."

Her cheerful mood vanished again at the thought that ran through her head at that.

"And I was the one who made it impossible again," she sighed, the constantly pervasive self-reproach palpable in her tone of voice.

Joey looked up at her sharply, almost angry. "Stop it, Rachel. Just… don't."

………

He had kissed her forehead when they stood outside the apartment and had thanked her for the evening. Little as it was, it made her happy somehow. If she just tried hard enough, she could interpret it as a step in the right direction. A step to being together again. Because, despite the occasional awkwardness, they had had fun. Especially the fact that they had remembered parts of their mutual history together seemed like the bond between them wasn't completely severed.

Joey had vanished into his room after they had said good night and she went to the bathroom after a while to take a shower and go to bed afterwards.

When she stood in the bathtub and let the warm water trickle over her belly, she grinned at the thought that in a few weeks, her feet probably wouldn't even get wet anymore when she took a shower. She held the shower head close to her belly, amusing herself with the baby's reaction to the splashing of water against its cozy home. The baby seemed to love water. Every time Rachel took a shower or a bath, the baby was awake and moved about in a way that seemed playful.

Still smiling, she climbed carefully out of the tub, trying to avoid to slip and fall. When she looked around for her towel, she noticed someone standing in the half opened door, staring at her with wide eyes. Joey.

For a split second she wondered why she wasn't frantically trying to find something to cover herself, why she didn't say anything, but it felt right somehow that he saw her like that. She couldn't remember one moment in the last months when she had felt calmer and more at peace.

She turned to him fully and noticed a change in the way he looked. It wasn't shocked surprise, it wasn't the way she had looked at him a few months ago when the same thing had happened to her. It was curiosity, a bit of awe, and a lot of desire.

It fueled the hope that had started to wake in her during their date even more. Maybe… maybe that was all he needed. Realizing that he still wanted her.

She ran her hand lightly over her belly and smiled at him. "It's a bit different to look at, isn't it?" she asked softly.

A shiver ran through her body and she wasn't sure if it was from standing stark naked and wet in front of an open door, or because of the excitement slowly stirring in her loins.

He swallowed a few time and then he croaked, "Yeah… and not just…," he gestured helplessly into the direction of her midsection, "I mean… your breasts…"

It was all she could do not to start grinning at that. When she had first noticed the at times slightly painful swelling of her breasts, her first thought actually had been that Joey would especially like that change.

"Yeah, amazing, isn't it? None of my old bras fits anymore," she smiled.

He swallowed again and she knew he was burning. She could see it from the way he took short, almost panting breaths, she could see the way his pupils were dilated and his cheeks were flushed. She knew it because she was burning, too. He lifted his gaze to her and took a very small, very tentative step towards her, a question in his eyes. Her heart started to flutter and she began to worry her knees might not support her for long if what she wanted – what she needed to happen really would. With excruciating slowness he lifted his hand and moved it towards her breasts, as if he wanted to feel that they were real. She couldn't suppress a gasp at the jolt that went through her as she felt the first touch of his warm fingers against her wet and now cold skin.

He jerked his hand back in an instant and she cursed herself for not being able to have at least a little self-control.

"You should towel yourself dry," he said while turning around, his voice still raw but with a grim determination in it. "You're getting cold."

When the door shut behind him, it took all her remaining strength not to cry.

* * *

TBC 


	18. TOW all the answers

**A/N: **Thanks to everyone for all the lovely reviews. I can't believe you guys are still reading so faithfully although I'm taking so inexcusably long with the updates lately. I would've given up by now if it wasn't for you guys. I'm especially glad that the story seems to have found new readers and I hope you all will enjoy what comes next. Which is only one of the shorter chapters, but an important one.

**

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TOW all the answers **

Joey was sure that he would never forget what he had just seen for the rest of his life. Rachel coming out of the shower. Naked, pregnant, glowing, wet, aroused… and waiting.  
Waiting for him to stop ogling her like some kind of pervert. Waiting for him to get over himself and his stupid fears, the stupid pictures in his head. Waiting, like she had been for almost six months now.

He knew he needed to tell her. He knew she needed to know what was up with him, why he couldn't even bring himself to touch her anymore.

It took her a long time but eventually she came out of the bathroom, tightly wrapped into a fluffy white bathrobe.

"Rach…" he started, gesturing for her to come to him.

She did, but sitting down on the couch, she made sure to bring as much distance as possible between them.

Before he could start to say something she looked at him sadly and said, "I just wish you could forgive me."

Joey was shocked that she believed that this was what was keeping him from her. Then again, how should she know what was up with him? He took a deep breath and scooted closer to her, nearly amused by her startled look. He took both her hands in his and tried to explain.

"Rachel, I've forgiven you the moment I saw our baby on that ultrasound screen, I think you know that. But I could never touch you again without thinking about how he touched you. Without wondering if I make you feel the way Ross made you feel. If you're wishing you were with him instead of me."

She looked at him steadily, unwavering and for a split moment he wondered if she had even understood what he had been saying. But then she looked down at their hands that were still tightly clasped together and was apparently struggling to say something that was difficult for her to admit.

"It was… it was actually the other way around," she finally managed while she looked up at him again, a sliver of uncertainty in her eyes.

"Was it?" he asked a little dumbfounded. Although he always had wanted to know why she had done what she had done, he had never expected to ever tell him voluntarily. She had always dodged questions like that in the past.

"Joey, I can tell you what happened," she began in a quiet voice that was pleading for understanding, "but I don't know if you really want to hear that. It might make it worse."

A knot of anxiety formed in his stomach and it felt like it pulled his heart right down there, too. Even swallowing painfully didn't do anything against the dryness in his throat and he suddenly understood why he had never really insisted that she told him. He was afraid of what she would tell him, of how he would feel about it.

Rachel looked at him, patiently waiting for an answer. There even was a hint of worry in her eyes. It was clear that it was now or never, if he really wanted to know, this was his opportunity to ask.

"Tell me," he said hoarsely, trying to sound surer than he felt.

Rachel let go of his hands and got up, as if she felt the need to get away from him to tell what she needed to say.

"When I went to his place, I really just wanted to talk to him. I knew he would take it badly, after hearing of this the way he did. You know we hadn't planned it that way. We wanted to talk to him alone first and everything."

She looked at him after she'd said that as if she waited for some sort of confirmation.

"Yeah I know," he said at length, not liking the thought of how hurt Ross must have been that evening. "I kinda forgot about that after hearing you were pregnant, though," he added as an afterthought, feeling the need to find an excuse.

"I didn't forget," Rachel stated and though it certainly wasn't meant that way, it made him feel even guiltier. "For me it felt as if talking to him would be a good place to start to get my feet back on the ground. I mean… we had this history, he has experience with becoming a parent and stuff, I thought it would be a good idea. So I went to him. But he was hurt and angry and I was… so confused. Seeing him so miserable just made things worse. And when I told him I love you… it was like I had… stabbed him or something. So… I kissed him."

"I heard him say once that you kissed him first," he said, more to himself than to her, noting somewhere in the back of his mind that Ross hadn't lied to him about that as he had first believed.

"And then I knew why I sought him out. I was so totally overwhelmed with everything, that I tried to go back to something, someone who was familiar to me. And he was. He was the reminder of a time when everything was easy. So I sort of pretended to be 1996-Rachel, talked about working at the coffee house and he played along. And then… stuff happened."

Joey frowned. "Why did he play along? He's a smart guy, even I would've known that if the girl needs to pretend to be someone she's not, there's something really wrong with the whole picture."

"I guess you have to ask Ross that question," Rachel shrugged. "Maybe we both needed to go back there to realize that everything is irrevocably in the past."

Joey mulled that revelation over for a while, but although it explained a lot, it didn't excuse anything.

"I would have been able to live with a kiss, but…"

"I know, Joey. We took it way too far and believe me, not a day has gone by since then when I didn't bitterly regret that. Even if you hadn't found out, it would have been the hardest thing to live with."

It took a while for the hidden meaning of her words to register, but when it did, he looked up at her sharply.

"You wouldn't have told me?"

Rachel visibly straightened and shook her head.

"No," she said with an air of finality. "Because in the end, it didn't mean anything and I knew how much it would hurt you. Telling you would've only served to unburden my guilty conscience on you." Her shoulders slumped a little before she continued her explanation. "You know, back when Ross slept with that copy shop girl, I really wished Gunther hadn't told me. Because for us, nothing would have changed. But the way it was, it changed everything, and there was nothing Ross or I could have done about it once it was out. If I hadn't told you, my punishment would have been to live with the guilt for the rest of my life, knowing how close I came to hurting the man I loved more than anyone before. Knowing that I almost destroyed the future of our child. The moment I saw you looking at me through that window, I knew that this was exactly what was about to happen."

Again a long moment of silence stretched between them during which he digested her words. But there was still something she hadn't told him and he was now more determined than ever to find out what.

"Before… " he started and made a vague gesture, "you said something about… it being the other way around…"

Her understanding nod saved him from having to explain further. He felt that he wasn't quite capable to articulate himself right now.

"Uhm…yeah… " Rachel stammered, "so, somewhere in the middle of all this, when I… when he…" She stopped and buried her face in her hands. "Oh my God I can't do this…"

"What happened?" he demanded.

(Flashback to day 52)

"How about we make each other forget about this horrible day?" Rachel breathed seductively, her lips brushing over Ross's.

"Very good idea, Rachel," he whispered back and closed the remaining space between their lips with a passionate kiss.

They kept kissing for a while until passion turned into to frenzy, emotions turned into obsession and kisses turned into a bruising battle of lips, tongues and teeth.

The next minutes felt like a race, like they had to stay ahead of something and they didn't want to think about what it was, nor did they care. Only vaguely did she register that clotheswere impatiently shed and that there was a general movement in the direction of Ross's bedroom. It was all a blur.

Intently staring at each other, lest someone would start thinking about someone else, they got lost in a sea of memories, of a revival of a past that held so much good for them, so much happiness.

When Rachel found herself naked in Ross's bed, lying under a just as naked Ross, the sensation of him softly pushing against her entrance had her close her eyes in anticipation of the exquisite sensations ahead. But as she did close her eyes, her frantic, desperate grip at what was long lost loosened and a breathless utterance of another man's name escaped her lips.

"Oh, Joey."

It was then that the race was lost. It was when she felt Ross's body going rigid above her, that she knew that the present had caught up with the past, that there was - and rightfully should be - no escaping it.

Ross scrambled off her so fast and uncoordinated, trying to squeeze himself into a corner of the bed as far from her as possible, that she almost started to laugh.

She sat up and carefully drew the comforter up to her neck, suddenly feeling weird about Ross seeing her naked.

(End flashback)

Rachel felt like dangling from the cliff of sanity while she waited for Joey to recover from the shocked stupor he seemed to be in. It had been okay for a few minutes, but now she felt like shaking him or slapping him or something just to get a response out of him. Kissing would be an alternative, too, maybe she should… no, as experience had proved, that led to even more problems.

"I can't believe this," Joey muttered under his breath just as she was contemplating pulling her hair.

"This isn't a lie, Joey. Ask Ross," she managed to say after taking a few calming breaths.

"I know you're not lying, Rach, but this is just so... weird. You mean he didn't even… finish?"

It seemed like an odd notion, but then again, it wasn't completely unlikely that he would ask that question. She sat down beside him and looked at his face until his eyes reluctantly met hers.

"Does that really matter?" she asked quietly.

Now Joey was the one needing distance. He jumped up and started pacing.

"No… yes… I mean, I don't know. God, this is… but… why did you spend the night? Why not come back afterwards? I was going crazy worrying about you."

She sighed unhappily. That was another thing she'd never forgive herself for.

"I know. We had talked. After… I said your name… we started to talk about everything I had intended to talk about with him in the first place. I guess I fell asleep somewhere in between one of Ross's rants about how he's never gonna have a successful relationship."

Joey was still pacing, shaking his head and running his hand through his hair in short intervals. It seemed like there was something about what she'd said that changed everything he had every believed her night with Ross had been. But it shouldn't and maybe she was supposed to tell him that she hadn't told him what happened to make her appear less guilty.

"If it makes it easier," she started, "it was still sex and it was still cheating on my part and it was still non-best-friend-behavior on his part."

That one stopped him cold and he turned to her glowering. His next words were spoken so loudly and angrily that, in comparison to their hushed conversation from before, it came across as yelling.

"I don't need to put it in categories, Rachel! I need to find out how I feel about this."

"I'm sorry, Joey," she whispered, terrified at his outburst.

As soon as he heard those words, his expression abruptly changed from agitated anger to sorrow.

"No, no, Rachel, I'm sorry," he hurried to say and sat down on the couch again, taking her hands. "This is a lot for me to deal with, I need to think about it. But I'm glad you told me. I always wanted to understand why you did it, how it happened. It couldn't have been easy to tell me that."

She acknowledged his apology with a nod and an attempted smile but soon started to get up and walk to her bedroom. After all, he had said he needed time to think.

* * *

tbc 

Please review.


	19. TOW the happy day

**A/N:** This time I want to give special thanks to one of my most loyal readers, Melanie. You really shook me out of the hibernation I seem to be in lately. Of course I'm grateful for all the other reviews as well, it still amazes me how much you guys like what I've written. I hope you keep enjoying.

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**TOW the happy day**

The next day they came into the coffeehouse together, greeting Phoebe, Mon and Chandler who sat on the couch.

"Hey guys."

Phoebe looked up at them and grinned widely. "Hey, look. It's the Tribbianis."

"Phoebe!" Joey admonished, glaring at her.

"I think you guys went on a date last night? So how was it?" Phoebe asked, unfazed by Joey's behavior.

Rachel sat down and tried to defuse the situation. "It was nice."

"Whoa… nice… wonder how you two managed to make a baby with that attitude."

Phoebe obviously still didn't want to let that go. She had always been the one pushing them. And although it had done them some good, it could be immensely irritating sometimes.

"We just talked about stuff," Joey said evasively.

"What stuff?" Monica asked.

"Actually we talked about you guys, and how you never found out about us, although we had some pretty close calls," Rachel said and noticed with satisfaction the grin vanishing from Phoebe's face.

"We already talked about the episode with the inappropriate touching," Phoebe said defensively.

Joey now joined the conversation too, grinningly smugly as well. "It wasn't just that."

"Yeah, and we already established that I was completely blind not noticing that I had walked in on you two doing it," Chandler admitted.

"Hey, we weren't doing it… we… well, at least not right at that moment."

Too bad that this comment from Joey made the other ones grin again, and it obviously encouraged Monica to ask a question that must have been bothering her for months.

"What about our wedding? You went missing for… at least an hour. And when you came back…"

Both Rachel and Joey smiled dreamily before Rachel said, "Oh yeah, that was an awesome day."

"You two should see your smiles. What happened?" Phoebe inquired curiously.

"I don't think this is something we should tell."

"Oh come on, please, can you at least tell us part of the story?" Phoebe asked again, "I mean we don't want to know all the gory details, but we know so much about all the pain and heartache you're going through, and we totally missed the time when everything was nice and happy between you. Why don't you tell us something like that for a change?"

"Pheebs, you don't really want to know that," Rachel said sadly, looking down on her hands.

Monica scooted closer to her and put her hands over hers. "You keep saying that all the time, but it's like Phoebe said, we know all the bad things, why don't you tell us about the good ones?"

It took a while, but eventually Rachel took a deep breath and began. "Okay, so… that day, before we went to the wedding, Joey told me he loved me."

Rachel took another shuddering breath after saying that, which made Monica think that it might not have been such a good idea after all to have them relive the memories of the times when everything was okay between them.

Since Rachel seemed to have problems continuing, Joey cut in. "And Rachel told me she loved me back, so… we were really… really happy."

Phoebe flinched at the crack in Joey's voice, regretting having pushed them to this. But the moment she contemplated telling them to forget it, Rachel spoke again. "Yeah, it was one of the happiest moments in my life. I felt like telling everyone 'I'm in love with Joey and he loves me too'."

"But of course, we couldn't do that and decided to wait until you came back from your honeymoon."

"Wait, wait, why couldn't you tell us?" Monica implored.

"Because it was your wedding day. I didn't want to steal your thunder again," Rachel replied softly, trying not to sound accusing. After all, what she had pulled on Mon's engagement day hadn't been nice at all.

The resulting somewhat awkward silence was interrupted by Joey saying, "And we figured that we had to tell Ross first anyway, and that it wouldn't matter if we waited ten days longer."

"But still, we were in love, deliriously happy and barely able to keep our hands off each other," Rachel continued.

They both wore little, wistful smiles and looked as if they were turning inwards, back to a place where they'd been happy.

"Yeah, in retrospect, the timing could've been better," Joey admitted ruefully. "It was the first time I said that to a woman and really meant it and I didn't know better, but telling someone you love 'em and being told they love you back and then being in a room with three hundred people when you desperately want to be alone with the one you love… not easy."

"And Joey had found some room where we could have a bit of… privacy."

Chandler seemed to remember something.

"You're not by any chance talking about that room you told me you walked into by mistake when we went to the hotel together? You were… location scouting?"

A light chuckle was Joey's reaction to that. "No, I really walked in there by mistake, but I thought it couldn't hurt to remember where it was."

"Quick question: am I right to assume this was not the first time you did it somewhere else than in Joey's apartment?" Phoebe asked.

Now Rachel was the one chuckling. "Yeah, you're right. Remember during the blackout when we talked about the weirdest place?"

"Yeah…?"

"Well, let's just say if we had to play this game again sometime, I would have a hard time deciding which place to pick," Rachel grinned.

Joey looked over to her for a moment and they shared a look that brought a whole bunch of highly erotic memories to life.

"Aw, look at you. You're so in love," Phoebe gushed, startling them out of their reverie.

Joey shook his head, smiling sadly. "Love wasn't the problem between us, Pheebs."

Monica saw a pained expression on Rachel's face and wondered what she must be going through every time Joey said something like that. Only now did she fully understand the reason behind Rachel's breakdown a month ago.

"Why don't you tell us the rest of the back story of our wedding?" Chandler chimed in, attempting to lighten the mood again.

"I suppose the rest falls under the 'gory details' category."

Of course the rest was not all 'gory details' as they had called it. But Joey did not trust himself enough to be able to tell more without starting to cry, when even the memory almost brought tears to his eyes. And there was no doubt Rachel would feel the same way.

Of all the fifty two days they had been together, that day had been the happiest one. The day they had confessed and celebrated their love for one another, while two of their closest friends had vowed to love each other for the rest of their lives. It was quite poetic, really. Not to mention almost ridiculously romantic. And although romance always seemed to him like a means to an end, when he fell in love with Rachel, it was like the icing on the cake, like something that completed his happiness. This overwhelming feeling of having left the real world and living somewhere where nothing and no one could harm you. He held this feeling of untainted, carefree happiness close to his heart as his most precious memory.

(Flashback to day 40)

Although concentrated on the bride and groom he was supposed to be marrying, Joey had been acutely aware of Rachel through the whole ceremony. Every time he stole a look in her direction, he had seen her smiling at him in a wonderful, heartwarming way. He had tried to imagine how it would be when Rachel and he were standing in front of a minister. How he would feel. And nothing but the happiness he felt when he looked at her filled his heart at that thought. He never would've thought it could be that easy to fall in love like that.

After the ceremony was over he tried to get to talk to Rachel alone, but there were photographs to be taken; speeches to be made and toasts to be proposed. They were sitting at the same table but not beside each other, so all they were left with was communicating with their eyes. Another thing nobody had even noticed.

Since they arrived a bit late, he hadn't even had the opportunity to show Rachel the room he had found, so their only option was to sneak out together. He jumped at the chance that presented itself after everybody started dancing. Before Ross even got out of his seat, Joey was at Rachel's side, asking for a dance.

"What about a tour of the hotel?" he whispered into her ear while they were swaying to the music. He chalked it up to his imagination when he felt her tremble.

"Are they gonna find us, if they should decide to come looking for us?" she replied, the trembling he thought he had felt even apparent in her breathless whisper.

"No, the room can be locked from the inside."

"Good," she said, lightly leaning her head against his chest, "I really need to be alone with you for a while."

The song ended and he took her hand, smiling at her. They walked out of the room hand in hand, not even thinking that someone might see them. Finally in the storage room, Joey locked the door behind them and turned on the lights. Light flooded the room with eye-piercing brightness.

"Wow, Joey … the light … it's awfully bright."

"Yeah, I know," he smiled, "but I have that covered."

He went to the file cabinet and took out the candles he had stashed there, put them on the file cabinet and lit them. Rachel switched the light off and smiled relieved.

"Better?" he asked.

"Much … much better," she said, walking in his direction.

"Wait, that's not all …" he grinned and opened another drawer, " … what oh … I can't believe this!"

"What is it?"

"I had two glasses and a bottle of champagne hidden in here …it's gone."

Rachel leaned against the table and shook her head. "Come here, Joe."

Reluctantly he shut the drawer and walked over to her, looking at her apologetically.

"I'm sorry Rach, I put it in there two hours ago. I can't believe it's not there anymore."

"I didn't come here to drink champagne, you know?" she said in a low, sultry tone that made it perfectly clear what she had come here for.

"I know," he said, not quite consoled over the way his perfect plan had been spoiled, "it's just … I wanted it to be perfect."

She smiled up at him while slowly tracing the color of his shirt with her index finger. "It is, Joey. It is. We're here… together… alone… finally alone…"

He let his head sink into the crook of her neck and inhaled the scent of her perfume mixed with the unique scent of her skin. It made him ache inside. "I love you. I wanted…" he stopped mid-sentence and shook his head.

"What did you want?"

He pulled back and looked at her seriously. "I didn't want to just have sex in some storage room. Not today, not after… what we told each other this morning. I wanted it to be something special, I wanted to… make love to you."

She smiled at him and lifted her hand to caress his cheek lovingly. "Who would've thought you a hopeless romantic?"

"Only took the right woman," he smiled back.

"So let's say we wait a few hours, and then we go up to our room and have all the time and privacy we want … let's say we even have a bottle of champagne and two glasses. What would you do?"

"At first I would want to drink to… us… to being in love… forever. Then I would take your glass and would put both of them away… you know… we don't want to get drunk…"

She nodded. "Got it."

"Then I would kiss you."

She cocked her head and made the impression of seriously contemplating his words.

"On the mouth?" she finally asked.

"Actually… no," he answered, getting into the spirit of the game she seemed to want to play. "I would kiss you here…" he gently touched a spot on the crook of her neck and ran his finger up until it almost reached her ear, " …and here… and here…"

Rachel closed her eyes and cocked her head a little to the side to allow his wandering finger better access to the places she needed him to touch. "Mhhmm… sounds nice."

He leaned closer to her so he could make sure she heard his next seductively whispered words.

"Then I take your hand and we go to the bedroom. Big comfy bed, white satin sheets …"

"…fluffy pillows?" she breathed.

" …lots of those," he confirmed.

"You sure know what I like."

"Then we kiss and I pull down the zipper of your dress… like this…" he imitated doing this by running his index finger down her spine which made her gasp.

"And then I take your dress off… like this…" he put his hands on her shoulders and gently ran them down her arms and he could feel heat starting to radiate from every inch of her body, indicating that the fantasy was coming alive in her head, that she really could see herself naked in front of him, just the way he saw her in his mind's eye.

He brought his hand to her favorite spot on her neck again. "Mhhm… I really like it when you kiss me there… it's… mhhmm yeah…"

He moved his finger further down and lightly skimmed over her breast.

"Joey… " she sighed. His other hand reached around her to her back as if to open a bra clasp.

"I'm not wearing… a bra," she whispered, having obviously picked up on his intention, which a lot of other women didn't even notice until their bra was dangling from his hand. But it wasn't her perceptiveness that surprised him right in that moment.

"You're not?" he asked, eyes wide.

A slow, lazy smile spread over Rachel's face and she looked at him with half-lidded eyes, some sort of triumph shining in them.

"In fact… I'm not wearing anything under this dress,"

He sucked in a deep breath and swallowed painfully because his throat had gone completely dry all of a sudden. "Nothing?"

"Nothing."

He took a few calming breaths and stared at her. "You're making this… really hard, Rach."

"I hope so," she grinned, and only then did he realize what he'd just said and grinned back a bit embarrassed.

"Yeah, that too."

Then he looked at her and got serious again. "You're beautiful. You're perfect." His hands lightly roamed her body and he brought his mouth close to her ear again. "Everywhere."

She took a shuddering breath, trying to form words, her smugness from before forgotten. "What… what do you do after… looking at me?"

"I lay you down on the bed and then I kiss you again… " he touched her lips, "…here", her neck, "…here", her breasts, "…here".

Then his hand wandered further south, traveled lightly across her belly, came to a halt at her pubic area, " …and here."

"Yeah…" she crooned, slightly leaning her head back and closing her eyes, "I love it when you do that."

"Me too."

This made her eyes snap open and she looked at him incredulously.

"You do?"

"Why else would I do it?"

"For… for me?"

Joey chuckled. "Rach, I know you like it and I try to make sure that it's… really good for you, but… I wouldn't do it if I didn't like it."

"What do you like… about it?" and it struck him as odd that she even had to ask. It was unfathomable that she shouldn't know. But either way, he was determined to let her know.

"I like the sounds you make when you're… getting excited," he whispered between feather light kisses placed along her jaw. "I like the way you feel, the way you smell and I… I really love the way you taste."

"Wow… I… I didn't know that."

He pulled back and looked at her searchingly. "You always thought I didn't like it?"

"No I didn't think you didn't like it, I just wouldn't have thought that you'd like it so much."

Another thought struck him, making him feel uneasy. "Is this because you don't like… doing the same with me?"

Rachel shook her head no, smiling again. "I like making you feel good."

While he still contemplated her answer, she added, "And while we're at it… do I get to kiss you too? Because the way it looks to me, I'm naked on that white bed, probably just had a great orgasm and you're still in your tux. Not that I don't like seeing you in that but… it seems a bit one sided."

Joey shrugged. "I figured I would get naked somewhere in between. You know… this is actually my own tux, so… "

" … you wouldn't have to get out of that many clothes, right?"

"Right."

In a movement he wasn't prepared for, she suddenly spun him around and pinned him against the table she had leaned on before.

"Okay so, first thing is," she said, "you lie down on your back and now it's my turn to kiss you …here … here… and of course… here", with the last word, she cupped his erection through the fabric of his pants and he groaned loudly.

"Rach… please… don't…." he panted almost in a panic. He felt too close to the edge already. There was no telling how long his well cultivated control would last under an assault like that.

"And since you were asking," she continued unfazed, while starting to unbuckle his belt and open his pants, "I like doing this with you, because I just love the way you say my name when you come."

With that she went down on her knees and took him into her mouth and conscious thought left him in a rush. When he felt his knees buckle under the intense onslaught of sensations, he put his hands on the table behind him, steadying himself. It wasn't long before he groaned her name in that way Rachel seemed to like so much.

After she'd gotten up and he had dressed again, she smiled at him sweetly. "Good?"

"Incredible… but , this was so not how I wanted…"

"Shh," she whispered, pressing her index finger against his lips. "Don't be silly. This was just me helping you to get through the rest of this evening. Because I really like that scenario you told me about."

"Well, I'm not done," he grinned back at her.

"You're not?" she asked coyly, cocking an eyebrow. Her playfulness brought a new surge of arousal, an unquenchable need to explore the depths of this seemingly boundless attraction between them..

"Let's just assume that in my 'scenario' I hadn't got the best blowjob of my entire life. And we're both… ready. So…"

He grabbed her around her waist, spun her around again and sat her down on the table and stepped between her slightly parted legs. Her dress made it impossible for her to spread her legs as far as she would've needed to get him close enough to feel at least a little friction where she needed to feel it.

A new appreciation for what she had done before came over him when he realized that this would give him the patience and control to continue the game they played.

"I slide myself inside you, slowly… carefully," he murmured in her ear seductively, while gently pushing his hips further against her and noticed how a violent shiver went through her. Her reaction encouraged him to pitch his voice even lower to a rumbling growl that seemed to affect her like an actual touch. "And it feels _so_ good… to be inside of you, to feel you around me… to be one…"

"Oh my God, Joey… oh…" she panted.

"… and I can hear you moan my name next to my ear and this makes me so hot … and I can feel your nails digging into the skin of my back and you wrap your legs around me and then … then I start to move … slowly, controlled at first … "

" … yeah… like that… Joey yeah..."

"… but the sounds you make, the way you urge me on and the way this just feels so indescribable … it drives me insane and I can feel my control slipping and I just…"

"… yeah…"

"I just let go and I'm… going at it… fast… hard… "

"Oh my God, Joe, please… please…"

Her panting breaths had a sobbing, pleading quality to them and he found himself unable to deny her unspoken request. He slipped his hand between her legs and found her swollen, pulsing and dripping wet. It surprised him a bit because he wouldn't have thought he could get her that far just by talking about doing it. Suddenly he understood why they said that the brain was the most important erogenous zone of a woman. Hadn't made much sense to him before.

Rachel seemed to have caught his surprise. "You have no idea how much I want you, do you?" she whispered breathlessly, pulling him to her so her mouth could crash against his in an eager, hungry kiss.

"Why don't you tell me?" he managed a challenge in between frenzied kisses, his fingers teasing her opening, but still not quite giving her what she so obviously craved.

"I've never wanted someone as badly as I want you… ahh…"

He plunged a finger inside her and pressed his thumb against her clit. She closed her eyes and let out a long moan.

"Not just now…" she panted while he started to slide his finger out and slowly in again.

" …not just today… always… "

He could feel how close she was when suddenly she opened her eyes again and what he saw in them almost knocked him over.

"I love you," she said, voicing what he had thought he had seen before she closed her eyes again and he could feel her inner walls fiercely contracting around his fingers.

Her orgasm left her shaking and gasping for breath. It amazed him. She never ceased to amaze him. Whatever he'd thought would happen in that room today, it wasn't this. He knew he loved her for this… not the sex… okay, not only the sex; but for the way she still surprised him sometimes, for her enthusiasm, her curiosity, the way she made him feel wanted, appreciated and truly loved. He took her into his arms and held her close to him, unable to imagine ever letting her go.

"I love you, too. That you love me back is… like a dream," hemanaged around a strange tightness in his throat.

Rachel pressed a lingering kiss against his temple, as if she wanted to leave a permanent mark. "I can't even imagine anymore why I never saw in you what I see now," she said when she let go. "You're the man I've always wanted to be with."

He drew her even closer, almost crushing her in his possessive embrace.

"Have you any idea what this does to me? I feel… so much. It's like my heart's gonna explode. I wasn't unhappy before, but what I feel now makes me think I was. My life's never gonna be complete without you anymore. I love you, Rachel. More than I could ever say."

(End flashback)

Coming back from his memory, he saw his friends looking at him with so much compassion in their eyes, it was disconcerting. He was used to being pitied by them, it was nice in a way to know that they cared for him that much, but this time they looked as if they wanted to cry.

He noticed that they didn't just look at him, they looked at Rachel, with the same expression and when he looked at her he knew why. Tears were running down Rachel's cheeks and she was staring right ahead, probably living through the same memory he just had.

The thought that he'd seen her cry so much over the last months suddenly overwhelmed him. He'd never wanted to make her cry. He had made a promise… _a promise_ never to do that. He had actually vowed to himself never to do that. But still, it was all he seemed to be doing lately.

"Hey, Rach, baby, don't cry," he said, gently wiping away her tears with his fingertips.

She smiled at him through her tears and gently touched his face. "You're crying too."

When he looked into her eyes, he saw something that went straight to his heart. She looked at him the same way she had looked at him back then. It was that look that had swept away his doubts, it was that look that had told him that her heart was his – forever. And she still – after everything – looked at him that way. In this moment, he felt himself believing in her again. In this moment he was starting to think he might have been an idiot for doubting her love for so long when he had all the evidence to the contrary.

"It really was… an awesome day."

Rachel nodded mutely, still smiling. "I never got that champagne, you know."

"Which, as we know now, was a good thing."

A loud sniffle made them aware of their surroundings again.

"Hey you guys, please," Joey said with forced cheerfulness. "That wasn't a sad story. And it gets even happier. After we came out of that storage room, we had a lot of fun on your wedding party and then… we went to our room and… had a lot of fun there too."

"Wait… wait. What do you mean 'our' room?" Monica asked.

"Rachel and I had booked a room together."

Phoebe gasped and asked. "So what I heard wasn't really you watching porn the whole night, right?"

Joey couldn't help but grin.

"That would be a definite no. Although… if you heard us, didn't it seem strange to you that those porn actors kept calling out our names all the time?"

"I tried not to listen that closely and I guess I fell asleep after her third orgasm."

"Wow, Rachel, three times," Monica said before pointedly turning to her husband. "Seems like someone had a lot more sex on my wedding night than I had."

Chandler shrunk a bit under her gaze. "Mon, in my defense, I was the groom, I had a very stressful day… and lot of alcohol."

Monica smiled and patted Chandler's knee, making it clear that she was only kidding. Only Joey felt the need to clear up a fact important to him.

"And to my defense, it was more than three. Phoebe said she fell asleep after the third so…"

Chandler sighed in mock exasperation. "Oh thanks so much, buddy, for making me look even worse."

Phoebe smiled to herself.

"I guess it was that kind of attitude that brought you the baby, huh? Seemed you two were really hot together."

Rachel, who had finally got a grip on her emotions again, felt compelled to reply to that. "Yeah, Pheebs, sex wasn't our problem either. It's trust. Without that, nothing else matters. Joey… doesn't trust me anymore. And I can't blame him for that."

* * *

tbc 


	20. TOW the trust

**A/N: **Thanks again for all the nice reviews. It's a great motivation to know there are people out there reading and loving the story. I have to admit, I often look at the reviews again before I start working on the story. Means... you know... keep it up. :)

* * *

**TOW the trust**

Something was happening. Rachel just knew it. In the span of only a few hours, there had been a major shift, a major change of what was happening between her and the man she loved and it left her with a breathless anticipation she could hardly contain. It also left her unable to drift off to sleep.

When she tried, when she closed her eyes, she kept seeing the look in his eyes after they had reminisced about Monica and Chandler's wedding. A look so different from the wounded near-hatred of the first day after her failing him, so full of something she didn't want to name for fear she was imagining it. They had kept stealing surreptitious glances at each other, looking away as soon as their eyes met, but seeking each other's gaze again only moments later. Their friends' company had felt stifling after a while and Joey had almost too obviously jumped at the chance to get away when Rachel mentioned that she needed to prop her aching feet up.

What affected her on a more physical level was what had happened when they had gone home in a tense, although not wholly uncomfortable silence. When she had shuddered a little, more an effect of her emotional turmoil than the chilling early summer air, he had reached out and taken her hand in his. The feeling of his warm, dry hand firmly enveloping her slightly cool fingers added to her confusion, sent a rush of adrenalin through her and helped built a sense of expectation she wasn't able to shake.

Her heart had pounded in her throat when they had reached the door of their apartment, when the moment had come when he had to either let go of her hand or…

He ended up doing something astonishingly sweet and utterly unromantic. He helped her out of her coat, led her to the couch, propped up her feet and gently massaged them until the leaden heaviness in her lower limbs gave way to a pleasant, tingling warmth. But as pleasant as it was it only made her hungry for more. More of his knowing touch, of his warm hands, of his undivided attention.

She was convinced that one of these days she would go crazy, torn between self-loathing and self-righteous annoyance at his indecisiveness. Some days she thought that maybe making a clear cut would be better than constantly being in this limbo of unfulfilled expectation, repeatedly dashed hopes and constantly guarded behavior. Some times she doubted it – he - was worth it. Most times she did not.

Even after watching a surprisingly dull TV movie, she still felt high-strung and on edge. Claiming she was tired and needed to go to her bed, she quickly left. She had almost convinced herself that she needed to sleep, but soon found out that wasn't likely to happen any time soon. Every time her wandering thoughts even fleetingly touched on today's events, another rush of nervous excitement rushed through her, leaving her with fast, stumbling heartbeat and a kicking baby, probably annoyed about the constant interruptions of sleep.

After a few hours of tossing and turning – or in her case – rather labored rolling from one side to another, she got up for a glass of water.

Joey was still watching TV or at least staring blankly at the screen, but quickly looked up when she appeared in her door. Acutely aware of his gaze following every one of her movements, she desperately tried to appear normal and in control, wondering how long that façade would hold.

But when he wordlessly held his hand out for her when she was on her way back to her room, when his eyes beckoned her to come to him, she stopped wondering anything.

Haltingly she took his outstretched hand and sat down on the lounger in her usual, somewhat uncomfortable position for their nightly talks. Only that he didn't seem inclined to talk. He just took her in his arms and carefully laid back on the lounger, bringing her with him so she was lying snugly beside him, her belly firmly pressed against his stomach, her face only inches from his.

It might have been an uncomfortable position, but she wasn't complaining. She wasn't even thinking. In fact, she wasn't even sure she was breathing. All she was aware of was her heartbeat thundering in her ears, his eyes locked with hers, the scent and warmth of his body overpowering her senses. He hadn't held her like that in months. Not since… then. There had been touching, holding hands, his hand on the small of her back, guiding her somewhere, a kiss on the forehead… but nothing like this. She wished that time would stop, that they could stay like this forever.

It was a revelation and a bit like a déjà vu, like that first night with her lying in his arms, not quite knowing what that night would bring. With indisputable clarity she realized that it had been this precise moment she'd started to fall in love with him. Because of the way she felt when she was in his arms. She'd often asked herself over the past months if maybe it was just the great sex, or the way he always told her she was special and beautiful and everything. If it was the way he treated her, or the way he made her laugh. But in the end it came down to this simple truth, she was happy when she was with him, and unhappy when she wasn't. So now, even while aching for more; she was truly happy.

She smiled at him and Joey smiled back, hesitantly and then cleared his throat.

"Rach, I've gotta tell you something."

Her throat went dry and her smile vanished in an instant. She knew that this was the moment things started to change and right now, she wasn't sure anymore if she wanted them to.

"When you told the others before, that I don't trust you, I didn't say anything. But I should have. I should've told you that I do. I trust you."

"You do?" she asked, uncomprehending. "Even after… what I did?"

At first it seemed as if he tried to avoid looking at her after she asked that question, but after a few moments, he looked straight at her again.

"When you told me… about what happened that night… with Ross… I truly believe that it didn't have anything to do with you choosing him over me. I believe that it is in the past now. I trust you, Rachel. With everything. Around everyone."

Hope enveloped her like his comforting embrace at the thought of what this admission could implicate.

"Joey… this… Are you… saying we could…"

To her disappointment, he didn't confirm this, and he looked like he wasn't done with what he wanted to tell her.

"I trust you, Rach, but the thing is… I'm scared. I know the fear now… the fear of getting hurt like that again. Because what happened… it almost killed me."

She let his words sink in for a long while. For six months she had scarcely thought about anything else than how to make him believe – really believe – that she would never hurt him again. A promise, in the end, was just words. Words that - in her case - had proven to be of no value. Whatever she wanted to prove, it had to be with more than words. But right now, words were all she had.

"I know. And I'll never be able to tell you how sorry I am for having done this to you. But I will never hurt you again. Not just because of a promise I've already broken once, but because breaking your heart, seeing you suffer for something I did… it broke my heart too. Even if you hadn't… ended it; if you hadn't stopped loving me, it would've ripped me apart to know that I'd hurt you so badly. I wouldn't be able to live with myself anymore if I ever do that again."

Joey lifted his hand and started to caress her face lovingly. The ache in her heart grew tenfold at his tender touch.

"I've never stopped being in love with you, Rach. I still love you, I think I always will … you know… _'until my dying day'_."

He smiled a bit at the reference and tears shot into her eyes. "I love you too, Joey. So very much… so much," she choked out, barely able to speak at all.

"I want us to be together again, to be a couple… ", he whispered, his voice slightly breaking too. Then he gingerly touched her belly, "…a family."

She started to smile and then she buried her face against his chest and cried and laughed and finally understood what Joey had meant back then when he said he felt so much it felt like his heart was going to explode. It was what she was feeling right now.

"Don't cry, Rach," he whispered. "I never want to see you cry again."

She lifted her head and looked up at him smiling brightly through her tears. "These are happy tears, Joe. I'm so… so happy. And I have a feeling there will be more of those tears in the future. Love you."

He smiled brightly and happily. "Love you too, Rach."

She felt an almost psychotic urge to kiss him, but as it were, their cramped position on the lounger and her severely limited maneuverability made that impossible, especially since he didn't seem to pick up on what she was trying to accomplish.

"Joe, can we please move this someplace else because… I can't even… kiss you here and I really want to."

His smile faltered and he closed his eyes, letting out a troubled sigh. The sight made her freeze and the feeling of dread took residence in her stomach once again.

"About that…" he started before she could ask him what was wrong. "You do realize that I can't… that nothing's gonna happen… between us… you know… sex-ually."

The way he dragged the last word, the way he had used it seemed slightly off to her. It didn't sound like something he would say, it sounded as if he had repeated what someone else had told him and Rachel was sure she knew who that might have been.

"Is this because of what Dr. Zimmerman said? That we shouldn't have sex during the pregnancy? That was bullshit, I asked my doctor. He just said that to you because he couldn't stand you."

For some reason, that wiped the furrows off Joey's face and replaced it with a expression of astonished curiosity.

"Why couldn't he? Because he thought it was my fault?"

"No, he recognized you," Rachel answered. During the two days in the hospital, she had soon found out where Dr. Zimmerman's misgivings regarding Joey had been coming from. "His wife is a DOOL fan and from what I gathered quite into Dr. Drake. I guess he was jealous."

The furrows were back again and Joey sighed miserably again.

"What he said… I thought it could buy me some time to… get over… the problem I have. I thought with you being pregnant and giving birth and stuff… it wouldn't come up for a while."

She had to close her eyes for a while as the meaning of his words hit her full force. Of course, it wasn't about Dr. Zimmerman's warnings. Even he wouldn't have objected against a few kisses. It was something, something deeper. Something she had even seen herself, back when she had tried to kiss him a couple of months ago.

"By problem you mean… the things you see when we… do stuff?" she finally stammered, hoping against hope that he she wasn't right, that it was something simpler, more superficial, something more easily solvable.

"How do you know that?" he asked with a mixture of embarrassment and surprise.

"I was there once, too, remember," she told him with a fake, pained smile. "I saw those pictures for months. I just thought…" she trailed off, at a loss for words. She didn't know what she'd thought. It was more that she'd hoped he would've been over this by now, he would be all right.

She sat up, suddenly needing to get some space between herself and his intoxicating nearness.

He sat up too, took her hands in his and looked at her pleadingly. "It has nothing to do with me not being in love with you, or not trusting you. Nothing with the pregnancy or anything about you, really. It's me. And it's not that I don't want to. I do. I want you so bad… I want to kiss you and touch you and… I want that. But you know what happened last time, so… it's probably gonna be a while. Maybe I just need a little more time… I think it has gotten a little better already."

It took a considerable effort, trying to force down the disappointment and frustration she was feeling. Smiling at him encouragingly while her own hopes had just been shattered. A kiss… she wouldn't even want more than that… just a kiss.

"Rach, I know I should've told you this before telling you I want to get back together. So if you don't…"

While he spoke she had looked down at their intertwined hands for a while and a sudden clarity came over her at the sight. It wasn't just a kiss she'd wanted. In fact, if it came down to it, if she really thought about it, a kiss was far down on the list of things she wanted. She interrupted him decisively.

"No, Joey, no. This… your problem… it changes nothing. I still love you and I still want to be with you, have our future… our family. I'm gonna wait until you're ready. Even if it takes forever."

Joey lifted his eyebrows and looked at her quizzically, disbelievingly.

"It doesn't bother you? You think it never would?"

Now a genuine, happy smile lit up her face, a continuation from the one from before, when he had told her he wanted to be back together.

"Of course it would. I mean… I loved having sex with you. It was always amazing and I wouldn't even have her if it wasn't for us… making love. But if this is what it takes to be near you again, to live with you and to raise our child together, it won't matter. Because that's what I really want. Come what may."

He smiled sadly and gently brushed his fingertips over her belly. "_Come what may_," he echoed and looked at her, "I love you."

"I love you," she mouthed back, her throat closed up with a fresh bout of happy tears that she tried to keep at by. She took a couple of deep breaths and when she felt she could speak again she gave his hand a gentle squeeze and looked at him pleadingly.

"Joe, can you… I don't want to spend this night alone. I never want to spend a night alone again, but tonight… I just want to feel you near me… nothing more."

He let go of her hand and nodded. "Okay, Rach, just give me… a few minutes, all right?"

She nodded understanding because she needed some time to calm down, too. She turned around and headed for her room, not looking back. When she crawled under her comforter, she was already in a state of heightened arousal that was fueled by the image of what Joey might be doing out there combined with the emotional impact of what just had happened between them. Considering that they hadn't kissed and barely touched each other, the tremors running through her body, the tingling of her skin and her short breath seemed almost unnatural, unreal. It had to be the hormones, there was no other explanation.

Over the last months, she had always thought that it was a pity she never had the opportunity to make good use of those pregnancy hormones. She was sure having sex would be an overwhelming experience. But as it was, she had to get rid of the tension at least for a little while before the man she so badly wanted was going to sleep right next to her.

Without wasting much time she brought her hand between her legs, softly stroking herself, sighing. She imagined him doing something similar on the lounger, imagined him closing his eyes and moaning, saying her name…

"Rachel?"

"Hmm," she moaned, completely caught up in her fantasy.

Then she felt the mattress shift because someone was sitting down on it.

Her eyes snapped open and she stared wide eyed at the man who was supposed to still be in the living room.

"Can I help you?" he asked quietly.

"Uhm…oh…Joey…I…"

It wasn't so much embarrassment that made her stutter, and she desperately hoped he knew that. It was the fact that she was so close, so unbearably aroused that she barely could remember her own name. Having him sitting on her bed wasn't making things any better.

He slowly crawled over her bed until he was face to face with her and then he slightly caressed her face.

"Want me to kiss it better?"

Hope flared up in her, all consuming, intoxicating, dizzying.

"You sure?" she breathed.

"When you told me before you would wait forever, I realized that I don't want to wait forever. I want to make love to you, Rachel. And if I can't make that happen again, who will?"

He leaned down and closed his eyes, moving in to kiss her.

"Wait," she stopped him, reaching over to the side of her bed, turning on her bedside lamp. "It might help to keep your eyes open."

And he did. As did she. She looked at him when he kissed her lips first gently, then with a little more fervor. She looked at him while they slowly reacquainted themselves with tastes and sensations they hadn't felt for so long, just to discover that they hadn't forgotten what they could make each other feel.

She looked at him when he kissed her chest, her breasts, when he cupped one of them with his hand, marveling at their noticeably increased weight and size. She watched him touching her naked belly, kissing it, skimming with his fingertips lightly over her protruding belly button.

As romantic and heartbreakingly sweet all of this was, it was slowly but surely driving her insane. She tried to push her need away again and again, but having him touch her like this, look at her like this… was beginning to take its toll. "Joey…" she whimpered pleadingly, hoping to get his attention.

To her dismay, he didn't seem to have heard her. He still let his hands roam over her belly, totally fascinated. "Please…" she moaned again.

"Shh," he shushed her, "I'll take care of you, I'm gonna make it better, I promise."

But instead of doing this, he reached to the light on the nightstand and adjusted it so her belly was even better illuminated. "There is a line," he murmured, " …going from here", he touched her navel, " down."

"It's a pregnancy thing," she answered, trying to keep the disappointment out of her voice, "When the pregnancy's over, it's gonna go away."

"It's kinda cute," he smiled and moved up a bit, getting closer to her face again, still smiling.

"It shows me the way."

With that he traced the line from her navel down to her pubic area and further down until he reached her entrance.

She had to close her eyes when his fingers plunged inside her and his thumb pressed down on her clit. He still knew exactly how she liked this and he did it so well.

"Ahhhhhhh… Joey, yeah… oh my God oh…"

An unstoppable stream of moans tore itself free from her mouth when he started to move his fingers but soon enough, he stopped again. "Look at me," he demanded.

And she did. She opened her eyes again to see him staring at her with eyes black as coals, looking right into her heart, into her soul. There was no hiding from this unyielding gaze, no secrets and no lies. But she hadn't anything to hide, she could allow herself to let him see everything. She let him see what it did to her to have him near her; to have him touch her; to have him make her come.

"I love you," she whispered breathlessly when the waves of her orgasm had ebbed away a bit, "I love you so much."

A happy smile played around the corners of his mouth and the warmth came back into his eyes as he leaned down to kiss her. This time, he closed his eyes and she allowed herself to close hers, too. She felt his kisses gain intensity and passion. If there had been an exploring and almost playful quality to his caresses before, now there was unrestrained need and she welcomed this because she was far from calling it a night. When she tried to get him out of the clothes he was wearing, the drawbacks to her condition became apparent. He sat up smiling.

"I think as long as you're pregnant, I can take care of this myself," he said while taking off his t-shirt and sweatpants.

She sat up and watched him undress, openly admiring what she saw. They just looked at each other for a long time before he touched her belly again.

"I don't want to hurt her … or you. So if you think Dr. Zimmerman might have been right …"

The words 'screw Dr. Zimmerman' were on her tongue but she swallowed them, opting for something less mood-killing. "Maybe for starters, we can try… not to move."

The glint in his eyes told her he knew what she was referring to. He laid down next to her and they picked up where they'd left off until they were both burning with the same need. With an agility that surprised even herself, she turned him onto his back, straddled him and then sunk down onto him in one fluid movement.

Even if she had been planning to, she would've been unable to move because the feeling of being together like this again was mind blowing. "Don't move… don't move…" Joey rambled under his breath and only when she was about to tell him she wasn't going to did she realize that he was saying this to himself. She clenched her inner muscles around him and his breathless words were interrupted by an almost pained moan.

"Look at me," this time the command came from her and he obeyed her just the way she had obeyed him before.

He went completely still, he even stopped shaking. It was a magical moment. When she let her gaze sink into his, she looked for something in his eyes, for a hint of doubt, a sliver of hurt, a trace of reproach. But she found none.

She found a heart that was as open to her as it was the day he first told her he loved her. As unguarded and vulnerable. He trusted her with his heart again, despite the scar she'd left, despite the fear she'd caused. Where his trust had been an effortless gesture before; now it was a precious gift, given out of a deep and unbroken feeling; out of love. In this moment she vowed to prove herself worthy of this gift for the rest of her life.

* * *

THE END 

... well no, just kidding. There are two more chapters to this, where I'm gonna wrap all the loose ends up in a cute little bow. But I guess it has been this chapter you guys have been waiting for. Anyway, let me know what you think.


	21. TOW the official announcement

**A/N:** Again, apologies for being so late with this chapter. I'm in a bit of a 'Brokeback' mood right now and had some trouble focusing my attention on straight guys again. ;) Btw, if anyone is interested, I've read the most impressive, heartwarming and well written BBM story during the last few days - Human Interest 2759902 by MadLori (it's a pretty long story, but soooo good). The author is such a gifted writer (professional writer at that) that I feel pretty inadequate in comparison. Good for you though, because that means I won't detour into writing for another fandom any time soon. ;)

Thanks for the reviews, having more than one hundred reviews for this story makes me more proud than I probably should be. Okay, on with the next to last chapter.

* * *

**TOW the official announcement **

Getting up in the morning to go to work was something that had never been easy for her. She had never been a morning person.

It had gotten even worse when she got pregnant and her blood pressure went south the minute she got out of bed. But this morning had to be the worst. Not because she was feeling bad, not because she was sick or tired or anything, but because when her alarm sounded and she opened her eyes, she found herself snuggled up against one Joey Tribbiani. Getting out of bed, leaving his embrace and dragging herself away from him, seemed like the hardest thing she ever had to do.

She felt him tenderly kissing the top of her head. "Morning, baby."

"Good morning," she murmured back, turning around to him and giving him a quick kiss.

"Rach, I'm afraid you have to go to work," he said after a while.

"I don't want to."

She looked up at him and the sight did nothing against the overwhelming wish to stay right here with him until the end of time.

"Maybe you can call in sick?"

"I already used a lot of my sick days for being in the hospital and stuff. But I really don't want to. I don't want to leave you."

He gave her another kiss. "I'm not gonna go anywhere. I'll stay right here."

Rachel propped herself up and looked down at him, her gaze wandering over every feature of his face, over the exposed upper part of his torso and back again to a contentedly smiling mouth and happily sparkling eyes.

"Is this a dream, Joey?" she asked, gently caressing his face. "Because it feels like one."

Instead of answering her right away, he took her hand and sensuously kissed the inside of her wrist.

"If it is, who cares, as long as we're dreaming it together?" he finally said when she had already forgotten she had said something before, winking at her.

Like a spring flood, the emotion pouring out of her heart rushed through her soul, taking away with it everything that threatened to taint, to overshadow what she felt for him, sweeping away painful memories like it were ramshackle huts, leaving shapeless ruins that were barely serving as a reminder of what had been there.

"I love you… so much," she whispered, not trusting her voice not to break or falter, but desperately needing to tell him.

"I love you too," he replied with a relaxed seriousness, that appeared so new to her, after seeing him in tense desperation for so long.

"I don't want to go," she stated after they had kissed again.

"You have to," he reminded her dutifully. "At least, if you like your job."

"Not as much as I like you," she gave back, partly because she knew he couldn't resist flattery and mainly because it was the truth.

Joey didn't look like he was going to take the bait. "Why don't we give you something to look forward to?" he asked instead.

Moving closer, she whispered in her best seductive voice, "Oh, I know what I have to look forward to, but I don't even have to leave this bed to get it."

"No, I mean…" he started but thankfully got sidetracked when she started to kiss the side of his face, her hand purposefully heading south. But then he grabbed her wrist right before she reached her target.

"Yes, that too," he said with a grin and then got serious again. "But what about, you know, making it official? They don't know yet that we're back together so…"

A look of alarm crossed his face when she pulled back from him, her obvious intentions all but forgotten. Another bout of feelings rendered her unable to speak for a while. He meant it. He really meant it. It occurred to her that, yes, she should've known he wouldn't say the things he'd told her last night lightly, that he had given the matter a lot of thought. But then again, things had happened so fast afterwards, she still had problems believing it to be the truth, to be real. At least she had up until now.

"God, Joey," she forced herself to say after the lines of a worried frown etched themselves deeper and deeper into his forehead. "That is… what I always wanted. Sitting down, making them listen and then telling them."

His expression relaxed considerably and he drew her to him again for a lingering, gentle kiss.

"Do you still know your speech?" he asked after he had pulled back.

Smiling, she nodded and started to recite what she had committed to her memory six months ago.

"We know this might come a bit unexpected, but Joey and I want to tell you that we're seeing each other. We've been in a relationship for almost two months now and we're really happy." Her smile grew wider when she came to the last part, lowering her voice to a husky whisper. "We're in love."

"You really still know it?" he asked, though he seemed not really surprised.

"Wasn't much of a chore. I think you got the harder part."

He nodded absentmindedly. "Yeah, I think I did."

(Flashback day 43)

Rachel came home bouncing with energy. Her day at work had been great and she looked forward to spending the evening with Joey. A big happy smile spread over her face at the thought and she briefly wondered what people might think who saw her grinning like that. Although she didn't really care. She had found love again and she had found out that she had completely forgotten how good it felt, how perfect, how wonderful.

Nothing could really faze her anymore, it never took more than thinking of him to elevate her mood. It never took more than a kiss from him to make the world around them fade into insignificance. It never took more than him murmuring "I love you", to make her the happiest woman in the world.

When she opened the door, she found her boyfriend on the verge of a mental breakdown, surrounded by a plethora of crunched pieces of paper.

"What happened here? Tornado came and messed up our living room?"

Joey smiled a little tortured smile and stood up, stepped to her and gave her a quick kiss. "I'm working on what to say to Ross."

"Aww, poor baby. Have you gotten anywhere?"

"Look around you, that's the result of four hours' work."

He sighed dramatically and plopped down on the couch again, put his head in his hand and stared down on another piece of paper as if he could force the right words to appear on it by the power of his will.

Rachel took the trashcan and started to pick up the papers, reading a few of them before throwing them away.

"Ross, I know you're gonna hate me in five minutes… hmm, assuming too much. Ross, what would you say if I tell you I found the right woman… aww, Joey, I'm the right woman?"

"This is what I keep telling you. Would be odd, though, to say it to Ross that way."

"Agreed. So… Ross, remember when I told you that women are like ice-cream?... Joey, what's that supposed to mean?"

Joey leaned back and propped his feet up on the coffee table, apparently giving up on accomplishing anything in the next minutes.

"The day you moved in with Monica, Chandler and I were at Ross's helping him to move into his new apartment. He was still broken up about Carol and I told him that thinking there might be just one woman for every man was as ridiculous as saying there is only one flavor of ice cream for everyone."

"And?" she inquired, vaguely remembering Ross telling her about that conversation, back when they had been together.

"Well, I sorta wanted to say that I had found my favorite flavor. But then I realized that this whole comparison is really immature, so…"

The thought that he regarded her as his 'favorite flavor' was a pleasant one and she wasn't so ready to outright dismiss this approach, but after thinking about it for a few moments, she decided that he was probably right. She threw the paper in the trash and reached for the next one.

"Right. Okay, what do we have here? …oh, there are no words on this one."

She turned the sheet around in her hand and looked puzzled.

"Oh, that's just a little drawing I did to distract myself," Joey said, giving her a lopsided grin.

"Really, what do I see here?" Rachel asked, still not seeing what it was that Joey had drawn.

He walked over to her and looked at the sheet, too. Then he turned it around in her hand. "You have to look at it that way."

"Oh…"

A little blush heated up her cheeks when she realized what she was seeing. Not so much because it embarrassed her, but because the crude little drawing depicted exactly what had occupied a lot of her thoughts on her way home. Suddenly her focus rapidly narrowed. All she was aware of – acutely so – was his body so tantalizing close to hers, his warm breath caressing the side of her face. With demonstrative slowness she put the trashcan down and turned to him, leaning into his body and looking up at him with an expression that she hoped was unmistakable. But just to make sure, she felt compelled to make the invitation clear.

"Maybe we should do a little of that and maybe then it will be easier for you to think to… find the right words."

"You always have the best ideas," he murmured while his mouth slowly descended to hers. "Love you."

"Love you, too."

………

Half an hour later she sat on his bed, back rested against his naked chest.

"Did it help?"

"It always helps," he replied and even though she didn't see his face, she could hear the broad grin in his words.

"I mean, what about… thinking about what to say? I mean, you still have a few days but then…"

"Do you have your speech ready?" he asked, stomping on the rest of her sentence. She knew it was his way of changing a topic that was extremely uncomfortable to him. He didn't like the idea of having to confess to Ross any more than she did, but it had been his idea that he should be the one to tell him and she had agreed, with not only a little relief. They both knew they had put it off long enough, using even Monica and Chandler's honeymoon as an excuse for 'we'll tell him later', but time was running out. Still, she couldn't bring herself to pressure him, so she went with his question.

"Of course I have. Wanna hear it?"

"Shoot."

She turned around and straightened up a bit, clearing her throat importantly and then once more when she noticed that he was appreciatively ogling her exposed upper body instead of paying attention.

When his gaze snapped back to her face, she began.

"Well, we know this might come a bit unexpected, but Joey and I want to tell you, that we're seeing each other. We've been in a relationship for almost two months now and we're really happy. We're in love."

His expression, that had been more of a leer while his eyes had started wandering again during her speech, changed to disbelief.

"That's it?" he asked incredulously.

"Hey!" she cried with mock exasperation. "What's that supposed to mean?" knowing full well what he meant. "It's perfect. It contains all the necessary information, it goes right to the point and it's short enough for them to be able to start asking questions without interrupting me."

He sighed resignedly. "Looks like I got the hard part."

"Yeah, I'm afraid you did."

(End flashback)

Chandler was bored – and a little annoyed.

Phoebe and Monica were chatting about something that didn't concern him and he was done reading the magazine he'd brought with him. Normally, Joey would be here and provide some sort of entertainment, but for some reason, he wasn't there.

Just when he was about to get up, excuse himself and go to be bored in front of the TV, the door opened and Joey came in, Rachel in tow. Holding hands with her.

Chandler immediately knew what that meant. Or at least he hoped he did. Detecting the cautious smile on Joey's face confirmed his suspicion. Trying to contain an idiotically wide grin, he vacated his spot on the couch for the couple and sat down on the armchair.

Monica and Phoebe greeted them, but soon fell silent when they too sensed the air of expectation that hang around them, the sense that something profound had changed.

Joey gripped Rachel's hand a bit tighter and looked around for a moment, his expression almost impassive, controlled in a way that Chandler hadn't expected. He had always thought once the two of them would get back together, they would burst with joy. And he knew it was there, apparent in their body language, in the way their eyes sparkled and their skin was flushed. There seemed to be a bouncing, restless energy in both of them that they had carefully restrained, roped together and covered up, probably in an attempt not to jinx anything by being too euphoric, too enthusiastic and too sure that this time, everything would work out just fine.

It had Chandler smiling a little. He knew the feeling.

Joey didn't say much. Especially nothing anyone of them didn't already know or suspect. That they still loved each other, that they wanted to be together – really together – again. Wanted to be a family.

All of them nodded solemnly and only a little, almost comical "Yay!" escaped Phoebe, as if they too didn't want to ruin the moment with exuberance. A strange silence crept between them during which they realized how little they had to ask to establish this new situation.

It didn't seem new to them. Joey and Rachel already lived together, had done so for years. They had already bought almost everything for the baby – together. They had gone to Lamaze classes - together - when Joey's shooting schedule allowed it. There was but one thing that has changed and that was something they knew nothing about. Not before and not now.

"Kiss her," Phoebe spoke into the silence and the eerie feeling that she had read his thoughts flitted through Chandler's mind for a moment.

"What?" Joey implored, as if he hadn't heard her right.

"You heard me, Joey. Kiss her. In all this time, we've never seen you two kiss. Not once, not even a little."

It took an effort for Chandler to bite back a grin at seeing Joey's face turn crimson until the furious blush reached his hairline. The very man who hadn't been much embarrassed by Chandler walking in on him and his many conquests during sex was uncomfortable with this little public display of affection. But maybe that was just the reason, that this time, it was genuine affection, genuine emotion that was to display, not just 'having scored'.

Then again, he didn't object, didn't try to get out of it. He just turned to Rachel, gently touched her face as if to ask permission and then leaned down and brushed his lips against hers. He was about to pull back, when Rachel closed the opening gap again, treating them to the sight of a languid, sweet and lingering kiss, followed by the two of them smiling at each other and looking for all the world as if they had forgotten that they weren't alone.

"Aww," Monica sighed after a while, making them aware of their surroundings again.

They both turned and smiled radiantly, their happiness brightly shining through the increasing number of cracks and tears in the surfaceof their reserved, tightly controlled demeanor.

"If we had known we only had to make out in front of you, it'd spared us a whole lot of thinking about what to say to make it official," Rachel quipped.

They missed a beat and then laughed. Not so much because what Rachel said had been funny, but because it was freeing, because everyone felt a burden being lifted from them. Not just from the reunited couple, but from all of them.

At least, from almost all of them.

………

When Ross came into the coffeehouse a few minutes after six, he stopped dead in his tracks when he spotted Joey sitting in the armchair. For the last months, they had somehow found a way to avoid each other. By some unspoken agreement, Joey was in the coffeehouse until six, after six Ross was there. It had worked so far, but now Joey was sitting there, looking as if he was waiting for him.

The rest of the gang was conspicuously absent.

Joeys expression was still stony and dark, but there wasn't the burning rage or the defeated desperation he had usually seen in his eyes. To buy himself some time, Ross walked over to the counter and ordered a cappuccino from Gunther. Then he slowly walked over to the couch, trying to look confident.

"Hi Ross," Joey greeted him politely, no trace of warmth in his voice.

"Hi Joe," Ross replied, opting to not ask him what was up. Luckily, Joey didn't let him wait.

"I came here to tell you that Rachel and I are back together. We decided we still want to have a future together and we want to be… a family."

As hard as he might have tried, Joey couldn't keep the happiness and excitement he surely felt at that thought out of his voice and it made Ross smile. "I'm so happy for you two. You have no idea how glad I am you could get over… what happened." He almost choked at his last words and looked away from Joey again.

A sharp feeling of loss cut through him when he thought about everything that had changed for him. He had lost a friend and he had no one to blame for that but himself.

"Ross," Joey spoke into the silence and just this one word sounded different than what he had said before. Less confident, less rehearsed. "I want you to know that I forgive you for what you did. I know what it means to be in love with Rachel, I know how hard it is… how impossible… to let her go. I have no idea what I would've done in the same situation."

Ross put his cup down on the table again, because his hands were shaking so hard, he was afraid he might spill the hot liquid. To say that what Joey had said took him by surprise would be a vast understatement.

"Joey, I'm so… thank you, man, I…" Ross was cut off by Joey lifting his hand.

"I'm not saying we're gonna be best friends again. At least… not now. It took me six months to get back with Rachel. So… I'm just saying you don't have to avoid me anymore."

"I had the impression you were avoiding me," Ross said honestly.

Joey chuckled at that without seeming to be amused.

"Not because you're afraid of me," Ross tried to correct the wrong impression. "But because… you just didn't want to see me. You know, Rachel never set foot in the copy shop ever again, even after Chloe stopped working there."

Ross didn't quite know why he felt the need to tell Joey that, maybe he just wanted to express that he knew how much it must have cost him to take that step.

Joey didn't say anything to that but the ensuing silence didn't seem strained or uncomfortable to Ross. It felt like an encouraging sign that Joey didn't seem in a hurry to leave.

"Can I ask you something?" Ross asked after a few minutes of silence.

With a curt nod, Joey gave him the sign to go ahead.

"If Rachel wasn't pregnant, if it had just happened, would you still have forgiven her?"

The second he heard the question coming out of his mouth, he knew he had put it totally wrong. Joey's reaction was accordingly.

"You mean like I only made the effort because she's pregnant with my child?" he replied with a sharp undertone to his voice.

"Joey, I didn't mean to…"

Joey waved his apology off and sighed wearily. "It's okay, Ross. I guess it's a fair question. You want to know if I might be more forgiving than Rachel was with you."

Ross nodded, a little astounded that Joey was able to put it into words so much better than he could.

"Thing is, as similar as these situations seem on the outside, they're not. Rach and I didn't even have a fight before she went to you, she just did it. On the other hand, she was upset and emotional and… you two pretended to be on some weird time travel…"

Ross felt his face burn like fire at the sudden embarrassment about Joey knowing about that. It had been a moment in his life he was trying his hardest to forget, to shove into some dark part of his brain where he never had to stumble over it ever again.

"She told you about that?" he asked, not quite willing to believe that Joey knew about that from Rachel. Then again, who else could have possible told him?

"Yeah, she did," Joey confirmed solemnly, as if it was no big deal at all. "Actually helped me to get a bit of perspective on that."

"What, to know that I was a total nutcase?" he spit back without thinking. He knew he was getting angry – irrationally so – at the humiliation he was just facing, but he couldn't help himself.

"Looked a lot better to me than the asshole who slept with my pregnant girlfriend," Joey gave back with equal irritation.

In this moment it became clear to Ross that they were walking on pretty thin ice, probably would be for a long time to come, regardless of forgiveness.

He shook his head and stared into his empty cup, not daring to look at Joey. Waiting for him to storm away in anger. But he didn't.

"Look Ross," he heard him say in a tone that seemed to ask for understanding. "I know you were in over your head with the situation. Fact is, we all were. That was the reason everything went so far downhill. We hadn't intended for you to find out that way, believe me. And I know … I should've talked to you before I started things with Rachel. If she wasn't pregnant, if things had been different, I would probably be the one of us sitting here feeling guilty."

Ross instantly knew that this was the closest Joey would ever come to apologize for being together with Rachel. He hadn't expected him to, he hadn't expected Joey to still value the rules of friendship so much, even after Ross himself had broken them so severely.

"I can't even tell you what I would've said if you had tried to talk to me," Ross said after mulling Joey's words over, finally mustering the courage again to look him in the eye. "I probably would've handled it as badly as I handled everything else."

Joey just shrugged and leaned back into the chair. "Who knows? I guess it's pretty pointless to think about the 'what if's' now."

There was an air of finality to his words and of course, he was right.

"So then, what now?" Ross asked, just the keep the conversation going. Even though they were traipsing through dangerous territory, it felt a lot better than not talking to him at all, like it had been for months.

"Seven weeks…" Joey said with a faraway look, "It's still seven weeks. That's more or less all I can think about at the moment."

Ross smiled a bit, lost in memories. "I suppose it's all you should think about at the moment, Joey."

* * *

tbc 


	22. TOW the baby

**A/N:** For some reason, the last chapter that should've just been a short one, turned out to have a lot more potential than I thought. (If even only a lot of potential for mushy sweetness, so consider yourself warned!) So, I finally decided to split it in two so you won't have to wait even longer than you already did (sorry for that), which means there is another chapter before this story is finished.

Thanks to all my faithful readers for your reviews and your patience and to Melanie for much needed bugging. :) Enjoy.

* * *

**TOW the baby**

Rachel was looking for a new word. A word that would describe how she felt in her skin right now. Because 'uncomfortable' wasn't even beginning to cover it. She was way beyond just feeling 'uncomfortable'. When she stood or walked, her feet and legs hurt, when she sat for too long, her back did. When she lay down, her breath was shortened to shallow gasps, because of a drastically decreased lung capacity. When she tried to move, she was sure she knew exactly what being a beached whale must be like. Then there was the additional joy of being kicked from the inside, which wasn't so much cute anymore, but sometimes downright painful. And to top all that off, it was in the midst of summer and hot like hell. No, she really wasn't only 'uncomfortable'.

And then there was this woman, this doctor, who was supposed to help her when she didn't feel well but acted as if everything was just fine and dandy. Which Rachel was well beyond having patience for.

"Why isn't she coming out?" she shrieked, a little too shrill for her own liking and glad that Joey wasn't here to hear it. "Pregnancies are supposed to last nine months. It's almost ten and she's still in there!"

The doctor smiled encouragingly, which did nothing to calm Rachel's irritation with her situation.

"Miss Green, you're just a week over your due date, there is nothing to worry about. I know, the last days of a pregnancy feel a little uncomfortable…"

Rachel let out a puff of breath and was sure that if she was a cartoon character, her eyes would be turning red right now.

"I'm not worried, I'm sick of being pregnant," she hissed, trying her hardest not to shout, which was what she really felt like doing. "I have half a mind to go in there and bring her out myself."

The doctor smiled her indulgent smile again and said, "There are a few things you might try."

"What?" Rachel asked impatiently, not hoping for much.

"In this flyer is a list of a few herbs you can try," the doctor said while handing her a little brochure. "And there is one thing that helps most women."

To her endless dismay, the doctor chose that exact moment for a dramatic pause.

"Do I have to torture it out of you?" Rachel asked through gritted teeth when no further elaboration was forthcoming.

The smile was a lot terser now, not that Rachel cared about that, but at least she got her answer.

"Having sex is a relatively sure method of helping things to get started."

Rachel blinked a few times and then leaned her head back, her anger suddenly draining out of her in a rush. A tiny smile stole to her lips at the pleasant recollection of the events from the past eight weeks, filled with rediscovering their relationship, with recovering both the emotional and the physical intensity of their love. Her increased size had limited the physical aspect a little, but hadn't made it completely impossible, much to both their delight.

"If that worked, she would've been born quite a while ago," she finally whispered almost to herself, smiling at the doctor while climbing off the examination table.

With an even wider smile, she took the flyer from the hands of the doctor, who seemed somewhat baffled by her sudden mood swing.

She could still give those herbs a try.

* * *

Joey was fidgeting. He knew his whole body was constantly in some kind of nervous motion, either his knees were bouncing up and down or he was rocking nervously back and forth, he just couldn't keep still. Nor could he concentrate on anything.

He wanted to. He desperately tried to find something that would hold his attention for a while, that would take his mind off the fact that the woman he loved was almost forty two weeks pregnant and that he was about to become a father any minute now.

It didn't sound like much. Ten days. But since the books said it could happen from the thirty eighth week on, they had been waiting for almost four weeks now. It began to take its toll.

He couldn't sleep, he lost his appetite, he was cranky.

He knew Rachel was there too, although she tried to play it down, to keep the appearance of staying calm, acting as if she was glad to have a few more days to sleep and to do what she wanted before the baby would change her life forever. But he knew that was for his benefit.

He knew she was far past the point where she felt comfortable with the pregnancy. He knew she couldn't sleep either. He'd seen her standing in the nursery at night, gazing in the empty bassinet, probably imagining how it would be to get up in the middle of the night if there was actually a baby in that bassinet, crying for its mother. Sometimes he pretended not to notice, pretended to be asleep when she came back to bed. Most of the times, though, he had gone to her, encircled her in his arms from behind and gently caressed her belly. The first time she seemed surprised, even jumped a little at his touch, but then she had leaned back into him and they had just enjoyed their closeness until they had both become drowsy enough to want to go to sleep again, or gotten drunk enough on each others presence to do… other things.

His nervous bouncing ceased for a moment. No, it really wasn't like those last eight weeks hadn't been a completely happy and wonderful time. They had been. But still, he wanted that time to end. He wanted the waiting to be over, wanted the sudden bouts of fear to stop that sometimes out of the blue reminded him of the risks of childbirth. He wanted to stop wondering if he'd be any good as a father, he just wanted to be one. There was a jealousy that he felt and resented, he was jealous that Rachel already had a connection to the baby that he – the daddy – had not. He finally wanted to see his daughter, he ached to hold her in his arms, to tell her how much he loved her.

"Joey, I know it can't be easy going through what you're going through right now, but you're driving us up the wall here."

He stopped bouncing and lifted his gaze to Chandler who looked at him not quite as pissed as his tone might have suggested. He looked compassionate.

"Where is Rachel anyway?"

"She wanted to go over to Monica, let her pamper her a bit."

"Maybe she should've come down here, too?"

"She doesn't want to go outside in this heat."

Chandler nodded and turned his attention to his newspaper again while Joey started drumming with his fingertips on the table, which prompted a warning glare from Phoebe.

"Joey, seriously, then go to Rachel and drive her crazy."

"See, that's the reason she told me to come here."

Gunther came to the table, bringing another soda for Phoebe and when he turned to go back he mentioned in passing to Chandler, "Your wife called. Something about things getting started."

Joey leaped to his feet in a second, knocking over his chair and only missing the table by an inch. He was out the door before anyone even started thinking.

When he barged into Monica's apartment, almost collapsing from having run up the stairs in the oppressive heat, Rachel sat on the couch, obviously concentrating on breathing.

He felt like passing out. Bracing one hand against the kitchen counter, he tried to catch his breath and come up with something to do or to say. It was the moment both Monica and Rachel turned their eyes to him, looking at him expectantly.

Right in that moment it hit him that from now on, he was the one who was expected to know what to do, he was the coach, the guy who was supposed to help Rachel through this and not only through giving birth. He was the guy who was going to be a father.

He realized he had two choices here. Freaking out and being a nervous wreck of a man, making himself a laughing-stock; or stepping up, facing the challenge and being the man Rachel deserved to have at her side.

After having taken a deep breath, he asked as calmly as he mustered, "How far apart are the contractions?"

Rachel's relieved smile made his confidence come back to him in at once. They would get through this somehow. Together. They had been through much worse.

"About five minutes," she said still smiling and caressing her belly, "But they're getting stronger."

He gave a serious nod, trying to remember everything he was supposed to do, worried he might forget something.

"All right. I'll hail a cab and as soon as it's here I'm taking you to the hospital and we're getting that baby out of you."

"Joey," Monica cut in, "I already called a cab, it should be here any minute."

"Thanks, Mon," he nodded at her distractedly. But then he suddenly had a feeling he had more to be thankful for than just her hailing a cab. "Thanks for everything, Monica," he added with a warm smile.

"You're welcome," she smiled back.

Phoebe, Chandler and Ross appeared in the door, all concernedly looking at Rachel, who concentrated on her breathing, obviously having another contraction. It was over before he even reached her and when he put his hand over hers, they shared a smile that conveyed both their wonder at the journey that now was so clear ahead of them. Now it was only a matter of hours and if it went as smoothly as it had until now, it would be a walk in the park.

* * *

"I said don't touch me!" Rachel barked at Joey, who quickly drew his hands back as if he had burned them.

Strands of hair stuck to Rachel's sweaty face, while she took deep, measured breaths, her face contorted with pain. He'd never felt so useless in his entire life. Finally, the contraction seemed to be over and she turned to him, looking a bit embarrassed.

"Sorry, Joe, I just can't…" he nodded bravely, carefully keeping his distance. Of course they had told him in the Lamaze classes that some women couldn't stand being touched during delivery and that he had to respect that, so he tried his best not to feel hurt.

"I think I can't walk around anymore," she panted after having fought through another contraction. They came pretty close together now, after only two hours and the midwife had been sure that it would probably take not more than another two or three hours for the baby to be born. Which to him – and certainly to Rachel – felt like an eternity.

They slowly made their way to the bed and he tentatively helped her onto it. After she lay down, she took his hand and squeezed it tightly.

"I'm glad you're here with me."

He was about to answer, when she closed her eyes with a pained moan and started breathing heavily again.

* * *

Joey had prided himself for being thoroughly prepared for the birth of his child. Sometimes he even thought he was better prepared than Rachel, because unlike her, he even had witnessed the birth of a baby before, so he knew exactly what to expect.

Or so he had thought.

Truth was, nothing could've prepared him for seeing the woman he loved suffer and feeling guilty about it because – yeah – it was sort of his fault. Back with Lydia, it had been another guy who was to blame and he was the knight in shining armor who had just been there to lend a helping hand. And – he had barely known her enough to care.

With Rachel, he felt her pain, even if only in the way she crushed the bones in his hand she held in a vice grip and he felt utterly useless for not being able to help her. He would've gladly taken it upon himself to go through that if only he could.

Then, suddenly, after seemingly endless hours of labor, everything happened all at once. Rachel was ordered to "Take a deep breath and push! Push!" and he was asked to "Please stay at the head of the bed!"

And then the world stopped turning and just like in some weird sci-fi movie, time froze and events culminated in one tiny moment. Rachel sagged back to the bed, eyes closed, relieved, completely exhausted, tears streaming down her face and making a sound somewhere between a sob and a laugh.

The midwife announced the arrival of the baby and some facts about respiration, skin tone, fingers and toes, but the voice and the sound most clear to him because of its complete novelty was the tiny, miserable cry coming from the newborn, from his daughter.

When the world started spinning around its axis again, when time snapped back to its usual flow, it had changed drastically. From now on, this point in time would mark the threshold between 'before' and 'after', because nothing would ever be like it had been before this very moment. Everything that had happened before, as dramatic and important as it might have seemed at the time, was dwarfed into insignificance at the life-changing experience they had just shared, would continue to share for every hour of every day to come. Even if he couldn't put it into words, it was this understanding that came to him like a vision when he first heard the voice of his child.

He watched the midwife swaddle the baby into a blanket, umbilical cord still attached and leading between Rachel's legs, slightly pulsing in a decreasing rhythm. Gingerly she put the baby into Rachel's waiting arms. Rachel, who beamed with pride and smiled and looked as relaxed and beautiful as if she hadn't just gone through the hardest and most painful hours of her entire life.

"Oh sweetie, my little angel, hallo. God… you're so… so beautiful," Rachel cooed at her in a choked whisper, tears filling her eyes once again.

Joey could only agree. Crouching down beside Rachel, he stared in wonder at the tiny human being, who just had single-handedly changed his world.

"She's the most beautiful baby I've ever seen," he said, his voice scratchy from the tears that burned in his throat.

Rachel turned to him and favored him with a warm and happy smile that he reciprocated. It felt like they were beyond words, that all the 'We're parents', 'I'm so proud of you', 'I'm so happy' could only poorly describe what they felt right now. So he just leaned down and placed a soft kiss on her slightly trembling lips.

There was one thing, though, he thought needed to be said.

"I love you so much," he whispered against her lips before pulling back and turning his attention to his daughter once again.

"I love you," he heard her say right next to his ear while he gently caressed his daughter's wondrously soft cheek with his index finger, marveling at the fact that this little miracle was indeed real.

"Would the daddy like to cut the cord?" was the question that brought them back to the reality of the delivery room, where nurses were bustling about, cleaning things and preparing a bath for Julia.

Joey nodded and reluctantly pulled away from his girls – his family, as he reminded himself, which put a proud grin on his face – and followed the midwife's instructions to sever the last physical bond between Rachel and the baby.

She was then taken from Rachel for another examination and then for bathing and getting dressed and then they said they would need to tend to Rachel now, which was obviously a cue for him to leave because he was ushered out of the room.

He stood there for a few moments to get his bearings and then the thought "Gotta tell the others" made him move his feet towards the waiting area.

When he caught sight of them, sitting on a couch, sipping coffee out of plastic mugs, talking, joking and laughing, he started thinking about what he was supposed to say.

'We have a daughter, everything went well, and mother and child are fine.'

He turned the words over in his head when the full implication of them hit him and made him stop dead in his tracks. Everything had gone well, Rachel and his daughter were fine. It felt like the happy and sometimes anxious anticipation of the last weeks had been holding him together somehow and now that everything was so suddenly over, he fell apart.

A shuddering sob tore free from his throat and he put his hands over his eyes, turning his head away so no one would see him cry. He couldn't help it. All the happiness he felt, the relief, the love – every single emotion seemed determined to pour right out of his eyes.

After he had gotten a grip again, he patted his pockets for a tissue, but came up empty. When he looked up one was handed to him by a tentatively smiling Ross.

"I take it everything went well," he said in a low voice, while Joey wiped his face and blew his nose.

Joey looked past Ross into the deeply concerned faces of his friends who stood about ten feet away. He smiled at them to counteract the wrong impression his embarrassing breakdown had probably made.

"Didn't mean to scare'ya, it's just…" he trailed off, at loss for words to explain what had just happened.

"I know," Ross said with a smile. "Happened to me, too. It can be… a little overwhelming."

Joey looked searchingly at Ross's face and discovered a banal truth that was nonetheless shocking to him. Ross had experienced that too, and he understood what he was going through without explanation. He probably had been the one to stop Chandler, Phoebe and Monica from rushing to him when they saw him cry, knowing that he needed that moment for himself. They had something very profound in common and needed no explanation for it. There was someone by his side he could come to for advice, for help, or just for a sympathetic ear and he found himself thankful for that. Thankful for having a friend like him.

Ross's smile changed to a broad and beaming grin. "Congratulations," he said loudly and shook his hand vigorously, but then froze for a second when Joey enveloped him in a bear hug.

"Thanks Ross," he said when he pulled back again and Ross acknowledged this monumental shift in their relationship with a nod.

Then Joey finally turned to the other three, still waiting their turn. He spread his arms as if he wanted to embrace the whole world and exclaimed.

"We have a baby!"

Cheers erupted and he found himself enveloped in a crushing group hug, not that he complained, and peppered with questions. Yes, very healthy. Yes, it's a girl like the doctor said. Her name's Julia. Yes, we decided that way before she was born. Yes, she already has hair, thick raven hair. Yes, like me. No, probably not my eyes, they're baby blue. No, I don't know if she looks more like me or more like Rachel. Yes, Rachel is okay and very happy. Yes, she was in pain, but nothing out of the ordinary – or so I've been told and I'm sure she's already forgotten all of it. No, Chandler, it's not scary, it's wonderful, really. No, you can't see her yet, maybe in a few hours. No, I don't know how much the baby weighs, I only had a few minutes in there before they threw me out. Yes, of course I'll let you know the minute you can see both of them. No, I don't want anything to eat or drink right now. Yes, of course I'm happy, never been happier.

* * *

Joey had always found babies to be cute. These miniature versions of human beings, that on the other hand lacked so many qualities that were known to define someone as human, like the upright walk and verbal speech.

He'd always loved to hold them, smell their unique baby scent, feel their incredible soft skin that seemed almost too fragile to touch it with callous male fingertips and entirely too tender to press the coarse, stubbly skin of a man's face against such a soft baby cheek.

Yes, generally, he'd always loved babies.

Maybe it was because of that, that he was entirely unprepared for the rush of feelings, the overwhelming realization of just how much one can love and adore his own child. Even now, almost twenty four hours after little Julia had been born, he stood there in front of the nursery window, glass dividing him from his daughter, and stared at her in wonder. Wonder at how this little girl had turned his life upside down (or finally from its head to its feet again) how she was undoubtedly the most beautiful baby between all the other sleeping or screaming little ones lined up in front of that window.

"_How wonderful life is, now you're in the world."_

Wonder at how much her birth had changed what he felt for Rachel, that it was even possible to love her even more than he already had. Wonder that now that she's born his child, he felt a bond to her so indestructible, that it gave him back a sense of security he thought he'd lost forever.

Wonder at how much difference it made that this particular baby was his. His daughter, his to love, hold and care for, his responsibility.

He sighed a little at the last thought, at the ever present fear of failing spectacularly at that. Because right now, he felt like he wanted nothing more badly than being a good dad.

"I thought you'd look happier," a quiet voice suddenly jerked him out of his thoughts and he turned to see Phoebe standing beside him, looking at the baby.

He smiled.

"I _am_ happy," he assured her, maybe stressing it a little too obviously. "It's just…" he trailed off and sighed, realizing how stupid it would sound if he'd actually said it.

"Afraid you won't be a good dad?" Phoebe asked, her tone still light and quiet.

Joey looked over to her, not too surprised she could read him like that. She always could.

"Yeah," he admitted with a nod.

Phoebe put a hand on his upper arm and made him look at her reassuring smile.

"Don't let it crush you. You're gonna be great as a father, Joe."

He smiled despite himself. "How do you know that?"

Phoebe chuckled a little and gave his arm a playful punch.

"Because you're a great guy. That's what she saw in you. That's why she fell in love with you."

Again, the thought made him grin. "I don't really think she considered my…uhm… paternal qualities, back then."

Phoebe shook her head, still smiling. "Maybe you should give her more credit. And yourself, too."

Then she turned to the babies again, sighing. "She's really beautiful, isn't she?"

"Of course she is," a grin still playing around his lips. "She's Rachel's and my child."

Phoebe let out a short, laugh. "Of course. You're just the perfect couple, right?"

His grin faded to a wistful smile and he once again contemplated the little box safely tucked away in his pant pocket.

"Right."

* * *

tbc


	23. TOW someone proposes

**A/N: **Finally the last chapter. Enjoy.**

* * *

TOW someone proposes**

Rachel wondered if she'd ever do anything else but looking at the face of her sleeping daughter. Who needed to read books or watch TV, when there was an indescribably cute little face to look at? The biggest surprise for her was that the tiny features were never restless or passive in sleep. There were myriads of expressions appearing and disappearing in quick succession. From the deepest frown, to an angelic smile so sweet, it made her smile widely too.

A knock on her door interrupted her intense study of her child's face and she turned to tell the visitor to come in.

It was Ross, carrying a gigantic bouquet of flowers. He had congratulated her before, but obviously he needed time to talk to her alone. She shared the sentiment.

"Hi Rachel," he greeted her awkwardly, lingering at the door.

Things had been weird between since she and Joey had reconciled. Ross had still tried to keep out of Joey's way most of the time without making it seem too obvious. She had tried to treat him as nothing more than one of her friends but had ended up ignoring him. Their struggle to appear 'normal' must have been so painfully obvious, that Joey had one day said to her, 'You are allowed to talk to him, you know.' She had just nodded and questioned herself why it was so hard for her to treat him like – for instance – Chandler.

Now that he was standing there with his flowers, a sheepish grin on his face, she knew why. Because she had never been in love with Chandler.

"Hi Ross," she greeted back with a warm smile. "Are those for me or are you visiting someone else in this hospital?"

Ross chuckled and the awkwardness lifted a bit.

"No, they're for you."

He managed to get hold of an empty vase, filled it with water and arranged the flowers in it.

"They're beautiful," she said, observing him. "Thank you."

"Glad you like'em."

He took a deep breath and she braced herself for whatever he had been coming here to tell her.

"I am so happy for the three of you. That everything went well and that you have this beautiful little girl. I wish you all the best, really."

It was a rehearsed speech, undoubtedly, but the open and calm expression on his face told her that it was sincere and heartfelt. Emotions bubbled up inside her, spilling over into her eyes.

"Come here," she whispered, choking on her emotions. When he did, she let herself be enveloped in a comforting embrace. In this second she understood, that she not only wanted, but needed this man in her life. As a friend, of course, and as the man she had experienced her first adult loving relationship with. Though they now had learned where to draw the line, they could not – would not – forget what had once been between them.

"Oh Ross," she whispered, "What would I do without you?"

"You'll never have to worry about that," he whispered back and at the realization that he felt about that just like she did, her tears started to flow freely.

After a few more moments of sniffling into his shirt she said, "Oh, hon can you grab me my other box of tissues? They're right on that chair under Joey's jacket.

Ross broke the embrace and walked over to the chair. He put away Joey's jacket and was about to reach for the box of tissues, when something Rachel didn't see tumbled with a soft thud to the floor. He got down on one knee to pick it up, but then halted mid-motion, apparently when he saw what it was. Her curiosity picked, she tried to see what he was holding and in this moment he turned around, still half-kneeling on the floor and in his hand he held… a little jewelry box with a glittering ring inside.

Rachel gaped and then quickly slapped her hand over her eyes.

"Put that away Ross! Quick! I'm sure none of us was supposed to see this!"

There was some more shuffling and when she decided it was safe to open her eyes again, Ross was by her beside again, handing her a tissue.

"So, he's gonna propose," he mused with a smile, but Rachel didn't feel like smiling. She felt like crying again.

"You don't know that. He could've bought the ring for thousands of reasons. It might not even be his. Maybe he's just taking it to… someone, or…"

"Rachel," Ross interrupted her, chuckling. "Do you really believe that?"

She looked at him for a moment and saw Ross's smile vanish when he met her gaze. Finally he seemed to understand that this was no joke for her, nothing to talk lightly about.

"I just don't want to…," she started and then proceeded with a sigh.

"… get your hopes up?" Ross finished the sentence she'd left hanging.

"Yeah, something like that I suppose."

He opened his mouth as if to say something, but then suddenly smiled brightly and surprised her by saying, "So, how's life as a mom treating you?"

Understanding the reason for his sudden change of topic - the need to stay out of what was only her and Joey's business - and thankful for that, she began to answer his question. And just like that, they finally found their places in each other's life.

………

Rachel hurried along the hospital hall towards her room. She'd left the baby with Joey to see the doctor and get the confirmation that she could leave the next day. Now she worried what had happened while she was away. Her anxiety wasn't about not trusting him with her child, but in her mind's eye she saw a screaming baby and a helpless father, desperately waiting for her to come back and save the day. It almost seemed odd when she arrived in front of the door to her room and was greeted with silence.

The door stood slightly ajar and she pushed it open just a bit so she could peer inside.

Joey was sitting in a chair, looking intently down to his arms which almost completely hid the baby securely nestled within. He was rocking a little back and forth and saying something to Julia in such a low voice that Rachel, though she only stood a few feet away, couldn't hear it.

A moment later she realized that he wasn't talking, he was singing. Voice toned down only for the child to hear, quiet and soothing enough so Julia would fall asleep. Rachel's knees threatened to give way when a warm current of emotion washed through her in an intense rush.

It was the tenderness in him that hit her so forcibly – the sight of him loving his child without anyone knowing. She felt suddenly overwhelmed by a raw, physical – if not exactly sexual – desire for him that compelled her to quietly step into the room and to slide her arms around his shoulders from behind. Propping her chin lightly on his shoulder, she too looked down at her daughter who was on the verge of falling asleep.

"Missed me?" she asked while rubbing her cheek against Joey's, still somehow mystified at this completely new burst of feelings, drawing her to him like magnetism. Like there was a new intimacy between them, as if they belonged together in some new way, as if their love was now solidified, deeper, more purely felt.

His lips found hers for a quick kiss when he turned his head to her.

"Of course we did," he whispered and then turned back to look at Julia. She was asleep, one tiny hand tightly wrapped around Joey's right index finger.

Seeing her daughter sleepmade Rachel remember her own exhaustion. She shuffled to the bed and climbed under the covers, propping herself up against the pillow so she could continueto watchJoey with Julia. 'My family' she thought happily.

Her gaze wandered around the room and she spotted a little bottle, half filled with tea. 'So there had been screaming, after all' she thought, smiling to herself. But the way it looked, Joey was able to handle little problems like that just fine.

"I think I might be addicted to holding her," Joey said under his breath, still watching Julia sleep.

"Might be a good thing, because there will be a lot of holding and carrying around to do in the future," Rachel quipped, her smile widening when he looked up and beamed back at her, the thought obviously not disturbing him at all.

A quiet "Rach?" and the touch of gentle fingers on her face made her open her eyes again moments later, though it took her a while to realize that she had fallen asleep while watching her little family.

"You should lie down if you want to sleep."

"I don't want to sleep," she yawned which earned her a chuckle.

"Liar."

"Not as long as long as you're here," she whispered.

"I'll be back first thing tomorrow morning."

"I know. Still, it so… so nice to have you both here with me."

"When you come home tomorrow, you're gonna have us all the time."

For some reason, his lightly spoken words choked her and she remembered the little box Ross had found._All the time_. Did that mean…

Before she could swallow the lump in her throat, Joey had vanished from her side and come back a moment later, holding the opened jewelry box.

Tears sprung to her eyes and started flowing when he told her how he could never imagine to want to spend the rest of his life with just one woman. How she had changed his mind about that and how he couldn't even wait until she was home again - although he had something special planned - to ask her this question.

"Rachel Green, will you marry me?"

Her tears were blinding her by the time she was supposed to answer his question but she still could see that there were tears in his eyes as well.

And of course - _of course_ - she would say yes. Yes to his loving expression and the tender touch of his hand upon hers. Yes to raising their daughter together, yes to a family with maybe more than one child.

Yes to his boisterous, deep belly laugh and his beaming smile. Yes to silliness and wet paper towels. Yes to peanut butter smoothie, yes to nights with popcorn and beer in front of the TV. Yes to Hugsy, taking up space in their bed (though he might have to compete for that withJulia one of these days).

Yes to comforting him after an audition gone bad and yes to going to premier parties, yes to admiring him on the small and big screen, regardless of how successful the outcome.

Yes to his handsome face and his raven hair that fell into his face – and into hers – when he leaned over her, kissing her. Yes to his soft lips and knowing hands, to his firm male body and the way he could make her feel. Yes to his passion and desire for her. Yes to the boundlessness of his love, yes to the way he had loved their child ever since the moment he knew about her.

Yes to their past, their present and to their future. Yes to being Mrs. Joey Tribbiani.

………

The tears had subsided eventually, as had the urge to scream her happiness out of the window or at least out into the hall. There still was an undeniable regret about not being able to share more than a few chaste kisses and close embraces, but that was dwarfed by an all encompassing feeling of happiness.

While she looked at the ring an odd thought came to her, more like a memory. When Barry had proposed to her, she had been looking forward to the wedding. To gifts and beautiful dresses. Right now, even looking at the beautiful ring, the thing she most looked forward to was the life they were going to have together.

"This is such a beautiful ring, Joey," she said dreamily. "I couldn't have found a more beautiful one if I had picked it myself."

Joey smiled, he knew how high praise that was, coming from her.

"I bought it the day before we wanted to tell the others," he said and then hesitated when he obviously felt she wasn't catching which day he meant. "You know… _that_ day."

She sucked in a sharp breath when she understood. _That_ day. There are good days and bad days. Days that - if you had the choice - you would want to relive on a daily basis for the rest of your life and days you shouldn't even bother to get out of bed for. And then there are days like _that_ day. Days you can't even think about without flinching.

She didn't particular feel like talking about _that_ day right now and from the way Joey had put it – and he usually didn't dance around the subject like that – neither did he.

"You wanted to propose that day?" she asked, cutting short what had threatened to become an awkward silence.

"No, I didn't," Joey said, chuckling a bit and shaking his head at the idea. Even as impulsive as he still was, he hadn't proposed after just seven weeks into a relationship. "But I was thinking since it was such an important day for us, I should get you something nice. Like a necklace or a pair of earrings. Something to remember that day by."

"Little did you know that you had already gotten me something to remember that day by," Rachel smiled, pointedly looking at the baby sleeping in its bassinet by her bedside.

Joey's eyes widened a little and then he snorted with suppressed laughter, trying his hardest not to wake the baby.

"Well, I haven't even seen it like that, but I guess you're right," he then said, still chuckling. "Anyway, while I was looking at all that jewelry, I saw this ring and I thought that it would be perfect for you, that when I asked you to be my wife, I would want to give you this ring."

The thought that even back then, even after only seven weeks, he had been thinking about things like that almost frightened her. Made her question if she had felt that way about him, too. If she had been so sure.

Then again, it probably didn't matter because if she knew one thing, then it was that she was sure now. _Come what may._

She lifted her hand and admired the reflection of the light in the flawless stone.

"It is perfect," she said and then, looking intently at him, she said, "It's a perfect fit."

* * *

Never knew I could feel like this,  
like I've never seen the sky before.  
Want to vanish inside your kiss.  
Every day I'm loving you more and more  
Listen to my heart, can you hear it sing,  
Come back to me and forgive everything.  
Seasons may change, winter to spring,  
but I'll love you until the end of time. 

Come what may, come what may  
I will love you  
until my dying day.

part of the song "Come what may" from the movie'Moulin Rouge'

* * *

**A/N2:  
**Now that it's finally done, I'm a little sad to part with this story, because it means parting with a bunch of incredibly loyal readers, who inspired me and always gave me the motivation to write and to bring this to an end. Again, I want to thank all of you.  
I'll post the first chapter of a new story today and would be delighted if you'd give that one a chance as well. 

Special thanks and greetings to all of you I have so shamefully neglected lately. Especially my dear Oliver. I haven't forgotten about you, even if it seems that way.


End file.
